Opinion The J&K ruse

With no clear criteria, the creation of new administrative units looks like a poll-time gimmick.

February 4, 2014 01:40 AM IST First published on: Feb 4, 2014 at 01:39 AM IST

With no clear criteria, the creation of new administrative units looks like a poll-time gimmick.

Over the last week, the stand off between Chief Minister Omar Abdullah’s National Conference and the Congress on the creation of new administrative units in J&K had dangerously frayed the Congress-NC coalition. But on Saturday, the state cabinet accepted the Congress-led cabinet sub committee’s (CSC’s) plan for the creation of 659 new units — about three times the number recommended by the Mushtaq Ganai committee report, championed by Abdullah. If the government has any clear rationale for such a vast administrative expansion, it has not been stated.

As it stands, such a liberal sprinkling of sub-divisions, tehsils, niabats and patwars on election eve, looks suspiciously like poll-time largesse. And Abdullah’s sudden, unexplained volte face seems driven by political calculations rather than considerations of administrative efficiency.

Certainly, there is a case for administrative decentralisation in J&K — smaller units would bring government closer to the people, and potentially enable more transparent, responsive governance. Over the last decade, there has been a tilt towards decentralisation, with eight new districts being created in 2006. But a bloated, unwieldy administrative structure does not make for better governance. This is especially true if no rigorous criteria have been applied for decentralisation. Apart from vague platitudes about striking a “balance” between the competing considerations of population and area, the Congress has offered none.

Both the Congress and the NC also stand accused of trying to cater to their own constituencies. While the Ganai committee report had recommended just 109 new units for Jammu, the CSC plan awards 348 new units to Jammu and just 274 to the more heavily populated Kashmir region. These contrasting blueprints have only sharpened polarisations in the state, whether it is Jammu vs Kashmir or Congress vs NC.

The administrative restructuring appears particularly hollow when political decentralisation in the state remains incomplete. Panchayat elections have been held since 2009 but it is only now that Abdullah has promised to strengthen the state’s Panchayati Raj Act. With the state government slow to devolve powers to panchayats, governance at the grassroots remains weak.

A poorly devised administrative revamp cannot make up for this basic deficiency. For the people of the state, it only reinforces a sense of alienation, of being subject to thoughtless and arbitrary governance.