Mir Farhat
Srinagar, May 3 (KNS): A day after Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti held the Board meeting of JK Wakf Board for its structural revamp, the board officials said that Board is showing improvements by expanding its building infrastructure and opening more nursing colleges in the Valley.
“It is appreciable and we are lucky that the chief minister chaired the Board meeting yesterday and showed her concern in revamping the board properties and infrastructure,” Vice Chairman Wakf Board Peer Muhammad Hussain told KNS.
Hussain said that as a first step in education the Board is opening three new nursing colleges in the Valley where modern and job-oriented courses for students will be taught by efficient faculty.
“Three new colleges, one each in Awantipora, Charari-e-Sharif and adding 50 more seats to Bibi Halima Nursing College are being started in August this year. Charar-e-Sharif and Bibi Halima Nursing college will have own buildings, while Awantipora will be run in a rented building till we construct its own building,” Hussain told KNS.
The vice chairman said that a lot of improvement has taken place in the last one year as records have been rebuilt, and rent has been revaluated by scientific methods by a reputed firm.
He said that the efficient faculty has been appointed for these colleges.
“Wakf has nearly 1600 shops in the Valley, out of which 1000 are located in prime locations in Srinagar city. But, shockingly, the shopkeepers are paying peanuts as rent. We have asked them to pay rent as per the re-evaluated method. If they don’t oblige, we will take strict action,” the VC said, adding that the chief minister has shown her support and cooperation in collecting the rent as per new rates.
The VC said that unless the Wakf property users don’t pay revised rent, the board cannot construct a specialty hospital on the pattern on Shrine Board in Jammu region.
Hussain said that the shops should fetch 30 crore annually as rent to the board but due to the users paying peanuts and that too not on time, nearly Rs 1 crore is collected annually.
“This is the sorry state and the shopkeepers should realise that they are damaging and misusing their religious property. Good sense must prevail among them,” he said.
The VC said that the Board will act and recover the pending arrears and rent from the users. “We will not relent and surely will act,” he said.
He said that the nearly 2000 kanals of apple orchards owned by the Board will fetch 1 crore revenue this year. “We have improved the condition of the orchards to make them able to fetch more income for us,” he said.
For collection of donation money, the Wakf board said that it is installing CCTV and electronic gadgetry at all Wakf Ziyartas “so that donation money is checked from pilferage and misuse”.
“CCTV has already been installed in Awantipora ziyarat and electronic gadgets will be installed soon at all ziyartas to keep check on the donation that people pay,” he said. (KNS)
‘Modern gadgets to be installed at Ziyarats’