Governor Satya Pal Malik, in a meeting held at Raj Bhavan this evening reviewed to-date status of security and law and order scenario in J&K and Ladakh.

Sh. K.Vijay Kumar, Sh. K.K. Sharma, Sh. K. Skandan, Sh. Farooq Khan-Advisors to Governor; Sh. BVR Subrahmanyam, Chief Secretary; Sh. UmangNarula, Financial Commissioner to Governor participated in the meeting.

The meeting reviewed the response to the Back to Village programme. To kick-start the follow-up to this programme, Governor directed the Finance Department to place Rs. 5.00 crore per district and Rs. 5.00 crore per Divisional Commissioner to start works on minimum of one work per Panchayat identified in Back to Village programme. Further the funds released by the 14th Finance Commission to Panchayats so far (Rs. 800 crores) can be leveraged by DCs by incentivizing Sarpanches to spend money on Back to Village works with DCs giving a small matching grant for each work.

Governor was given assessment of the prevailing situationregarding the adequacy of essential supplies and delivery of various publicservices to the people including electricity, water supply and health careservices in Kashmir, Jammu and Ladakh. He was informed that there is no dearthof essential commodities and their supply is being ensured to people. Whilereviewing the law and order situation and preparedness of the governmentmachinery, Governor emphasised the need for constant alertness, preparednessand synergy among various departments and agencies to enable dealing withemerging situation in a coordinated and effective manner.