Daily Excelsior: Srinagar: Sunday,
December 04, 2016.
Recently the
Jammu & Kashmir State Accountability Commission (SAC) took suo moto
cognizance of some media reports about official misuse of state helicopters and
aircraft. The SAC called the move ‘unjustified’ because some ministers were
unnecessarily making use of these Flying Machines. State Accountability
Commission (SAC) according to newspaper reports has issued notices to the Chief
Minister’s office &Civil Aviation Department seeking their response on this
issue.According to SAC’s notice and previous orders of State Information
Commission (SIC), it is given to
understand that Government doesn’t have
any defined policy that regulates the use of state’s helicopters and aircraft
by the Ministers and other functionaries of the Government.
Info under RTI :
In February this year a valuable information
came to the public domain under Right to Information Act (RTI) related to the
official misuse of state helicopters. It is a known fact that there are no
official rules / guidelines related to state’s flying machines (choppers and
aircraft). The Civil Aviation Department, which looks after these choppers and
aircraft,according to the RTI reply doesn’t even maintain the proper record
about the people accompanying the Ministers during the travel in Government
choppers/plane.These details were revealed after the then State Chief
Information Commissioner (CIC) G R Sufi disposed off an appeal filed under Section
16 of J&K RTI Act 2009. Appellant Advocate Vilakshana Singh had filed an
RTI application before the Civil Aviation department seeking information on 12
points vis-à-vis the names of ministers in PDP-BJP Coalition Government whose
spouses also used State chopper/plane services to attend the marriage ceremony
of the then Minister of State for Revenue and sitting MLA from Kishtwar, Sunil
Sharma. The information seeker had sought total expenditure on the
transportation of the passengers and the departments that bore the expenditure and the policy being
followed for allowing the use of official flying machines .
The Public Information Officer (PIO) in CM’s
Secretariat who is designated to provide
the information under RTI law expressed ignorance about the names of the
spouses of the ministers in the list of passengers, who had used the official
Chopper to attend the marriage ceremony of the then Minister of State (MoS)
Revenue at Kishtwar.
After the intervention of State Information
Commission (SIC) the PIO in CM’s office provided the information as he was
issued an order for the same by the then State Chief Information Commission
(CIC) G R Sufi. State CIC found during the case hearing that there were no
written and prescribed rules for availing the helicopter /plane services.
Taking this matter seriously, the then
State CIC G R Sufi asked the Chief Minister’s Secretariat to
take the matter seriously in order to ensure transparency and accountability
while these flying machines are being pressed into service. He had advised that
necessary regulations be made in this regard.
Budgam villager seeking chopper details :
In another case of similar nature one Bashir
Ahmad Malik S/O Ghulam Rasool Malik from Khag Drang district Budgam had
approached us regarding the same issue during the year 2012. The then CM Omar
Abdullah had visited Beerwah area in the official helicopter. Bashir argued
with us that Beerwah happens to be only 35 kms from Srinagar and why shall a
chopper be used for the this short distance travel at the cost of tax payers
money ?This man wanted to seek information about the official choppers under
RTI Act . We assisted this poor man in filing the necessary RTI application.
The CM’s office did not provide him information within the stipulated time of
30 days. He filed an appeal , this was not responded and finally the matter
landed in State Information Commission (SIC). G R Sufi who was the State CIC
during that time directed the Government to make the official chopper rides of
CM public. The information was finally provided to Bashir a man living under
poverty line (BPL). It was revealed that 12 core rupees were spent by the Govt
in 2 years & on several occasions CM had traveled to Gulmarg ,Pahalgam and
Dachigam. To this NC’s senior leader Sheikh Mustaffa Kamal had said that he
traveled to these destinations in connection with Tourism promotion. It became
a big news not only for the local print media but TV channels like CNN IBN and
Times Now ran the news for one complete day. Finally Omar Abdullah tweeted
that, he would curtail his chopper
rides. He said “people have started questioning
us” and during that time he along with his few Cabinet Ministers
traveled by road from Srinagar to Jammu.
Conclusion
:
People who
are now ministers in Government issued statements and raised hue and cry about
the official misuse of State chopper by Omar Abdullah and his team in 2012 .
Many of these people are in power now and unfortunately they too are doing same
thing. How can one justify using state aircraft / helicopter to attend a marriage function of a Minister
along with family members ? I appeal
Chief minister to order for issuing proper regulations in this direction so
that use of Government choppers and aircraft can be regulated.
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