When I was asked to deliberate on disposal of cases under Forest Rights Act -FRA especially Community Forest Rights-CFR during a national consultation at Nagpur, Maharashtra recently, I expressed my deep anguish about lack of elected panchayat bodies in J&K that would take up such cases. I along with some of my colleagues had gone to Nagpur to attend this national level programme titled “Bio-diversity Conservation and Sustainable Livelihood Through Community Forest Management”. The participants from almost one dozen states were shocked to know that for the last 2 ½ years Panchayat and Municipal elections have not been held in J&K ?

The 5 year term 4291 Panchayats in Jammu & Kashmir which includes 33,597 Panchayat wards officially ended on January 9, 2024. The five year term of Urban Local Bodies -ULBs also came to end in November 2023. It is now more than 2 ½ years and we have no elected members of Panchayat or Urban Local Bodies (Municipal Corporations , Councils and Committees). In addition to Manipur, Jammu & Kashmir is the only UT / State where we have no elected local bodies and our elected Govt is also not at all bothered about this? I remember when the last Panchayat and ULB elections were held in 2018, the Prime Minister and other top leadership of ruling BJP had highlighted that initiative for months. The ULB and Panchayat elections were followed by District Development Council-DDC elections which were held in November-December 2020. This was much appreciated as this ensured the setting up of a three tier panchayati raj system. The term of DDCs also ended early this year. For the last more than 2 ½ years we have defunct rural and urban local bodies and neither Govt of India nor Jammu & Kashmir Govt authorities are uttering a word ?  

UNDERMINING DEMOCRACYThe absence of these local bodies is not only impacting our governance at village level but it also undermines democracy. For the last many weeks I am getting calls from different villages that their village........

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