JAMMU, FEBRUARY 7: In 2018, the Government of J&K came up with a creative idea of establishing a company named Jammu &Kashmir Infrastructure Development Finance Corporation (JKIDFC) Limited to tide over the infrastructural deficiencies in the erstwhile state of J&K. The Company was envisaged to fund the unfunded or long pending languishing projects. Each of the department furnished the details of all the significant yet pending projects to the Finance department for funding through this Corporation. The initiative of setting up the JKIDFC has also been noted as a best practice by the NITI Aayog, said a press release of DIPR.
The Corporation is working with a vision to provide an innovative solution for funding the infrastructure needs of Jammu and Kashmir.
By law, this Corporation was authorised to raise loans from financial institutions including state/nationalised banks for completion of unfunded/languishing infrastructure projects in J&K. The corporation was authorised to raise a loan of Rs 8000 crore in the most economical manner through a competitive and transparent process. It was also mandated to finance any new infrastructure projects, which are a priority as far as their public utility is concerned.
The company is being manned by the Board of Directors chosen from the senior officers of the administration headed by Financial Commissioner, Finance, also Chairman & Managing Director of this Corporation.
The sole purpose behind bringing this Corporation into existence by Finance Department is to provide an innovative solution for funding the infrastructure needs of J&K.A ‘High Powered Committee’ (HPC) has been constituted by the Government which conducts regular meetings to take decisions regarding the business to be transacted by JKIDFC.
Till date, nine such meetings have been conducted by the committee under its chairman designate. The HPC has the power to approve, sanction, modify and substitute any of the projects being funded under JKIDFC. Besides this, it also authorises, monitors and regulates the projects taken up under this ‘languishing projects’ programme.
The Government has deputed a dedicated team of officers/officials exclusively to carry out day to day affairs of this company. They include the Executive Director, Director Finance, General Manager and many other IT professionals and ministerial staff, who work behind the scene to make the Corporation a thriving enterprise.
The job of this team is to track each project financed under JKIDFC and update its status on the portal on real time basis. Photographs of the ongoing works along with the percentage of completion are given against each of the sponsored projects. Besides, they process the payment requests against the works and also carry out field visits to assess the progress and quality of works being executed on ground.
Recently, the Board of Directors (BoDs) also empowered a committee comprising of the Executive Director, Director Finance and General Manager of JKIDFC to authorise payments for approved languishing projects. This was done to ensure avoiding any sort of delay on account of release of timely payments to projects being executed by the funds provided by JKIDFC.
Some 2274 languishing projects worth Rs 5883 crore have been financed under JKIDFC by J&K government to fast track their completion. These include 817 projects worth Rs 1719.50 crore of PHE Department,593 projects of Public Works Department worth (Rs 1311.37crore), 169 of PDD (Rs 302.91 crore), 102 of Health (Rs290.75 crore), 76 of I&FC (Rs 188.77 crore), 67 of H&UDD(Rs 355.06 crore), 113 of School Education(Rs83.63 crore), 92 of Industries(Rs 717.29 crore), 100 of Youth Services (Rs420.57 crore), 11 of Tourism (Rs 105.05 crore), 31 of Higher Education (Rs151.57 crore), 8 of Agriculture (Rs23.57 crore), 44 of Animal Husbandry (Rs7.01 crore), 7 of Horticulture(Rs 30.35 crore), 20 of Technical Education (Rs15.80crore), 5 of Estates (Rs 97.97 crore) and few vital projects of many other departments.
It is targeted that 1256 projects worth Rs2219.16crorewill be completed by the end of this financial year. Among them, 422 projects (Rs 626.34 crore) are to be completed by PHE department, 180 (Rs201.31crore) by R&B department, 167 (Rs 299.80 crore) by PDD, 76 (Rs 188.77 crore) by I&FC department, 98(Rs 67.83crore) by School Education, 88 (Rs142.67 crore) by Youth Services& Sports, 50 (Rs 70.72 crore) by H&ME, 48 each by Housing (Rs153.01 crore) and Industries Departments (Rs 314.97 crore) shall be dedicated to public by March 2020. Expenditure of aroundRs479.04croreshas already been made by the Departments executing such projects.
First time projects worth cost of more than Rs 400 crores are under execution under JKIDFC for upgrading the sports infrastructure across J&K. It includes development of a number of new sports stadiums in the rural areas of J&K. The department of Youth Services is augmenting sports infrastructure across length and breadth of J&K incurring the cost of Rs 202.28 crores. Besides these, it is also completing some important sports infrastructure projects like recently inaugurated Maulana Azad Stadium, Jammu, Bakshi Stadium Srinagar, TRC ground Srinagar and Gani Kashmiri Memorial Sports Stadium Srinagar at a cost of Rs 70.12 crores.
Some of the mega languishing infrastructure development projects approved by JKIDFC are Comprehensive Sewerage Scheme, Jammu (Rs108.16 crore), Comprehensive Sewerage Scheme, Srinagar (Rs154.69 crore), EDI Campus Bari-Brahmana, Jammu (Rs50.74 crore), Jambu Zoo (Rs 49.17 crores), Women Entrepreneurship Development Centre, Jammu (Rs32.24 crore), Industrial Estate at Kathua (Rs81.15 crore), BPOs across J&K (Rs60 crore), and Drilling of Hand pumps across Kashmir region (Rs33.50 crore).
It is pertinent to mention here that most of the projects funded by JKIDFC include creating public utilities like roads, bridges, water supply schemes, sports facilities, educational institutions and industrial estates. All of these projects are believed to be of high public importance and once completed would create immense changes on the developmental landscape of J&K besides easing the day to day lives of general public to a large extent.
