Governor’s Admin Ignoring Kashmir’s Tourism, Education Sectors: PDP

Srinagar: Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has said that the governor administration is ignoring Kashmir in major fields like education and tourism and the strategies adopted by the PDP government to put these sectors back on track have been deliberately frozen.

In a statement, senior PDP leader and former minister Naeem Akhtar stated that despite Kashmir valley got this year blanketed by the heavy snowfall, the government isn’t marketing it in any way and is “reluctant” to lure tourists towards the picturesque valley.

“Professional marketing strategies adopted by the state government in the past seem to have been deliberately frozen. The present weather in Valley is enjoyable for adventurers, skiers and Kashmir lovers but there is no marketing and advertisement being done by the governor administration. A major campaign should have been on for winter as well as for coming spring and summer seasons but it seems that all activities regarding that have been shelved,” Akhtar said.

He added that the winter tutorial program was introduced as a major reform in education sector and the reason that it has collapsed at present is the unnecessary fiddling with its original plan of implementation by the governor administration.

“It was a revolutionary measure in the field of education and was started through a widespread coaching network in schools, in particular to cater to need for tuition classes and personality development of the students in the remote and inaccessible places of the state and to do away with idling time of students, teachers and education apparatus as a whole. The program has contributed in improvement in the performance of the students to a large extent,” Akhtar said.

However, according to him, the original plan for its implementation was fiddled with by the governor administration and such an important program that provided a great opportunity and an alternative to costly coaching classes especially for the students from poor families is, as per the report, on the brink of collapse. (GK)