Cabinet of Compliments: Ministers’ mutual admiration masterclass

Srinagar, Sep 30: Jammu and Kashmir’s cabinet of six ministers appears to have adopted a new model of governance, involving reviewing one another’s constituencies, patting each other on the back, and delegating governance responsibilities to the bureaucracy.

After the National Conference (NC)-led government on Monday went on one such exercise, former minister and People’s Conference (PC) President Sajad Lone took to the microblogging site ‘X’ and termed it, “An obituary of governance.”

In a roasting post, he wrote: “Two news items about the elected government that caught my attention… the Chief Minister and two Ministers spent a day in one Assembly constituency. The remaining three ministers reviewed each other’s constituencies in the Secretariat, along with the officers. My sympathy with those IAS officers who have worked hard to pass the IAS exams, having to sit with three ministers to review the respective constituencies of the three ministers. What model of governance is this? … This government will go down in history as one of the most invisible and inefficient governments. …We have a cabinet of 6. And 4 Assemblies were reviewed or visited. So, for every one ministerial or chief ministerial assembly constituency, 1.5 ministers spent the day reviewing or visiting it.”

Talking to Greater Kashmir, Lone said, “I have been a minister and I thought 24 hours in a day were very less. I always had a sense of guilt that I was letting down people, particularly at the ministerial level.”

He said that running a ministry was not about transfers but about scripting a new pathway of change.

“You need to sit with your officers, you need to deliberate, you need to go to the internet and see what is happening in the rest of the world, and come up with remedial proposals as a minister. Your job isn’t done by nodding in agreement after a Secretary briefs you and you sign something,” Lone said.

He said that the ministers were there to lead.

“They are there with a mind of their own. With so much overload, they should work tirelessly. I fail to understand how they have so much time,” Lone said. “The CM has 29 to 32 departments under him, including Power, Tourism, Revenue, Urban Development, and Finance. What has he done so far? There is no liquidity today. The expenditure till date is less than 2 to 5 percent. This government has not spent any money.”

He said that these three ministers sitting and reviewing each other’s constituencies was a first, and then sending the news about it for publication is another first.

Lone said that this government had only been fishing for excuses.

“I literally begged for getting a medical college in Handwara. I raised the question of setting it up in March. Now it is October. The land is still not there, and the Rs 555 crore amount sanctioned for it in all probability will be shifted by them to Udhampur, and if they won’t, then they have to surrender it,” he said.

Lone said that the Chief Minister Omar Abdullah-led government talks of dual control coming in the way of their functioning.

“But where is the dual control here? They talk of LG, they talk of Centre, they talk of the US government and the Government of Britain coming stopping them from functioning. Those powers have nothing to do with such governance. It is something they themselves have to do. So, they fail and then hide behind these excuses,” he said sarcastically.  “It is so difficult for me to face people because I am a traveller in a bus that doesn’t have a driver.”

For the bureaucrats, Monday’s meeting in the civil secretariat must have been sobering.

“It was like a badly scripted sitcom,” an official privy to the meeting said.

However, senior NC leader and Member of Legislative Assembly (MLA) Pampore, Justice (Retd) Hasnain Masoodi told Greater Kashmir that there was no problem in ministers reviewing each other’s constituencies.

“No one should have any objection to reviewing development works in a constituency as this is a result-oriented process,” he said.

Masoodi said that the minister who is incharge of a particular department reviews the works of that department in the constituency.

“I don’t see any harm in this. He (Sajad Lone) is putting it in the wrong way. The focus is not on the individual constituencies of the ministers. They review the developmental works of a particular constituency, see what roadmap of development for that constituency is, and what challenges are being faced, and then they take stock of it,” he said.

The NC MLA said that it was a norm and a matter of routine.

“A minister looks after one or more departments. So, the minister’s review will focus on the work of the entire department in the constituency,” Masoodi said.

On Monday, ribbons were cut, plaques unveiled, supporters clapped, and cameras clicked.

Governance had apparently been reduced to a travelling roadshow, a bizarre exercise in political role play, and a mathematical autopsy, each minister reviewing the other’s constituency as if swapping report cards.

Talking to Greater Kashmir, senior People’s Democratic Party (PDP) leader and former minister Naeem Akhtar, in his sarcastic comment, said, “It offers some silver lining. Otherwise, they are not doing anything. If they reached out to each other’s constituencies, at least some small good might be done in their own constituencies.”

He said that it had been over a year after the NC-led government returned to power, and their performance was yet to be audited.

“This government is insecure despite having 50 members. Chief Minister Omar Abdullah is still not able to come up with his full cabinet. What is a small cabinet of six expected to deliver? Even a cabinet of nine or 10 ministers is not enough. He is not even able to fill up those ministries and is just protecting his personal luxuries and amenities,” Akhtar said.

He said that the NC was happy depoliticising its own narrative.

“They have completely depoliticised it during the last 1 year. That is why Kashmir is where it is,” he said. “It is a party that repeatedly gets the confidence of the people, repeatedly betrays them, and repeatedly junks the political issues. Forget political issues; they are not even delivering on Tameer-o-Taraqi, etcetera. They are divorcing their basic political ideology and political narrative. They no longer talk in political terms, and Kashmiris are facing its consequences.”

The state’s fiscal health might be tottering, treasuries struggling to meet routine obligations, and development spending limping; ordinary citizens wonder why their ration depots run dry, why schools lack teachers, or why hospitals run short of medicines, the ministers seem busy perfecting their art of mutual appreciation.