The Jammu Chamber of Commerce and Industry President Rakesh Gupta Monday alleged that one nation-one tax and dry port multi-modal logistics park, two main initiatives of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, have been defeated in Jammu and Kashmir by vested interests in the administration as also the previous PDP-BJP coalition government.
The one nation-one tax has not seen the light of the day in Jammu and Kashmir, he said, adding that if it is not so then what is this collection of Rs 800-900 crore in the name of State Toll Tax at Lakhanpur in Kathua district bordering Punjab. Pointing out that this tax is finally paid by the common man living in Jammu and Kashmir, he said that “it has resulted in huge increase in transportation cost, hardships to drivers and cleaners, inflation and above all a den of corruption’’. The state’s special status is for welfare of its people or to penalise them, he questioned.
Similarly, in the presence of PM Modi and Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, a MoU was signed between state government and Dubai Ports World for establishment of a Dry Port in Samba and Ompura. However, the project appears nowhere in sight as the state government is yet to provide land for it, he added.
The Dry Port included warehouses, special storage solutions, CA stores and cold storage chain in addition to complete logistic solutions, Gupta pointed out, adding that the said project was brought to bring down transportation cost by at least 25 per cent in the geographically disadvantaged state, besides connecting its business community worldwide.
The delay in initiating the Dry Port project has resulted in immense loss to the common man also in the state as foreign direct investment worth thousands of crores of rupees, besides loss of thousands of skilled and unskilled jobs, the Chamber leader said. He regretted that this has come in the state when, unfortunately, on one hand, the labour class is migrating silently to other states for want of job and on the other hand, educated unemployed youth are falling easy prey to drugs as some are even choosing the path of violence and death.
He questioned the Prime Minister’s Office as to whether the initiatives and announcements made by PM were not for the people of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh? He further challenged the PMO to clarify whether the one nation-one tax and dry port initiatives have been defeated by the state administration or it has been deliberately kept in silence due to reasons best known to it.
In the wake of forthcoming PM’s visit to Jammu, such a clarification is of utmost importance before the Chamber, its affiliated associations and the civil society of Jammu and Kashmir decide to again launch an agitation for implementation of these two initiatives in the coming days, Gupta said. He also contested BJP leader Ram Madhav’s statement that they got two AIIMS for the state, adding that it was sanctioned for Jammu province only after a joint struggle by the people of the area.
