Centre's delegations visit Srinagar to finalise governance-related reforms in J-K, Ladakh

Delegations of senior officers recently visited Srinagar to discuss governance-related reforms in the soon-to-be-created union territories of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh, according to an official statement issued on Wednesday.

A department of administrative reforms and public grievances (DARPG) delegation led by Additional Secretary V Srinivas visited Jammu and Kashmir on September 4-5.

Another team led by Joint Secretary V Shashank Shekhar paid a visit on September 20-21. In continuation of this, another visit to Jammu and Kashmir was made by a team led by Shekhar on October 15-16, the statement issued by the personnel ministry said.

Minister of State for personnel, public grievances and pensions Jitendra Singh had called for such visits to discuss the department's initiatives for the two union territories for firming up the road map ahead, it said.

The team that visited J&K on October 15-16 had detailed discussions with regard to implementation of e-office across the government of J&K; capacity building/training of J&K officers; conference on disaster management, it said.

The team also attended the public grievance hearing on October 16, conducted by K K Sharma, advisor to Governor and witnessed the public grievance mechanism prevalent in J&K, wherein the advisors personally listen to the grievances of the common man, and try to resolve the issues, the statement said.

The team also requested the J&K government to facilitate detailed write-ups on success stories based on 11 applications received from them under innovation categories for the prime minister's award so that minimum government, maximum governance special issue could be brought out expeditiously.

The team also met K Skandan and K Vijay Kumar, advisors to Governor and the principal secretary, IT department, secretary (rural development) & secretary (art and culture, J&K ) and discussed in detail about various J&K initiatives that are planned to be undertaken by DARPG.

"It was also discussed to look at producing short films/videos on the rich culture and heritage of J&K. A two days' conference on disaster management is scheduled on November 30, 2019 at Jammu," the statement said.

The union territories of Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh will come into being on October 31.