By JSG
Jammu Tawi, February 13: Agriculture has remained the least priority in Jammu Kashmir and its crisis is widely recognised, but the strategy to take the “next leap forward” is yet to emerge.
A recommendation of the Sub-Group on Agricultural Development approved by the Group of Ministers on Administration and circulated amongst all the States for suitable action vide No. 8-48/76-Gen.I/Coord dated 29th May 1976 by the Union Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation is making rounds in the social media these days. The commendation reads as “Department of Agriculture should be made responsible for the planning of production and supply of the essential agricultural inputs arrangement for marketing of the produce, field extension work including demonstration and farmers training programmes, should be structured as a technical department and to be manned and headed by competent technical experts.”
JK Government vide Order 184 GAD of 2019 dated 07-02-2019 appointed a KAS officer as Director, Agriculture who would take over the charge from the 1st of March 2019 after the retirement on H.K. Razdan, the incumbent Director.
The officers and other functionaries of Agriculture Department feel as such orders have nip in the bud the career of the professionally trained agriculturist who should have been, by all legitimate standards, ordered to be the Director of Agriculture, Jammu. The agriculture technocrats in the allied departments of Agriculture, Horticulture, and Floriculture too feel that the KAS lobby is desperate to encroach upon and capture the senior positions of technical departments because of their unjustifiably swollen cadres during the previous regimes. “They have succeeded in their attempts because of their proximity to corridors of power,” it is alleged.
It is complained that over a period of time the non-technical officers, after becoming the heads of the departments (HoD), learn a few basic things from the subordinate technical staff and then, with the support from the fellow KAS officers at senior positions in the Government, ride over their heads. The angry officers in the departments say that novices are being imposed upon their heads from the non-technical Services who do not know about A, B, C of Agriculture and allied subjects.
He compared the situation with that prevailing in Agriculture and allied departments and said that by scuttling the prospects of technocrats (professionals) for the HoD posts in Agriculture, Horticulture, Floriculture, etc. and keeping several senior level posts vacant for months together, a severe blow has been dealt to the whole work force of these departments. He lamented that their due promotions through DPC have not been granted for the last more than 35 years.
There is a general feeling among these officers that the technical departments and the institutions that were established for the welfare of the farming community are now being put to immense ridicule by such actions of the government. The staff and the officers work overtime. A number of officers at senior and middle level positions are holding two or more posts for the past several months and doing extraordinary work without any matching remuneration.
Another deeply hurt Horticulture Development Officer told the Northlines that the technical departments have been established to be manned and headed by technical experts because their attitude, aptitude and skills in the field get sharpened by every passing year, but the administrative officers keep on moving from one department to another and “bossing over”, without responsibility.
“One fails to understand the purpose of Agriculture Universities, Agriculture Colleges, and other technical institutions. While the governments day-in and day-out keep on churning out the Skill Development Schemes”, the officer continued.
Look at the fate of thousands of already existing technical graduates in agriculture, engineering and medical sciences. They have better training than the ones envisaged under Skill India Mission, but neither gets the job in time nor are they granted timely promotions. The governments feel helpless in filling up the vacant posts in the concerned departments and such an invaluable national resource is getting wasted. If this is the treatment to be meted out to the already skilled and highly skilled class of public servants then the governments may please shut down the technical universities, colleges and institutions and employ the administrative officers (the babus) only to all the jobs,” he said.
