A woman from Pakistan administered Kashmir (PaK) has been elected unopposed as Sarpanch and Panch in Khumriyal area of north Kashmir’s frontier Kupwara district.

Arifa Begum (35) had come to this part of Kashmir along with her husband Ghulam Mohammad Mir via Nepal in 2010. Arifa, originally a resident of Palandari village in Muzaffarabad had submitted her nomination papers for both Panch as well as Sarpanch wards in Khumriyal-B in the frontier district.

There were no nominations against her and as such has been declared elected unopposed for both Panch and Sarpanch wards, an official from the district administration said.

While talking to GNS, Ghulam Mohammad Mir said that he crossed over Line of Control (LoC) in 2001 and remained there till 2010 before returning home via Nepal along with his wife Arifa.

“During my days in Pakistan to earn the livelihood, Mir said adding “during the time I marred Arifa”.

A security officer told Global News Service (GNS) that Mir had ex-filtrated in 2001 for arms training and had returned in 2010 and later surrendered. He said that the Arifa has been provided adequate security as part of the government decision of securing all the candidates contesting Panchayati elections in Jammu and Kashmir state.

Deputy Commissioner Shopian has directed officers and officials of Horticulture and Agriculture departments to fast track the loss assessment exercise and submit their reports in short time.

Talking to KNS, DC Shopian Dr. Owais Ahmad said that he has dire ted the officers and officials of horticulture and agriculture departments to submit their loss assessment reports after a detailed survey of the snow hit orchards in the district to him in short span of time.

Saying that he has already apprised chief secretary about the losses caused to orchardists in Shopian district, the Deputy Commissioner said that he has also directed the concerned experts of agriculture and horticulture departments to provide technical guidance to snow hit orchardists. He also said that the concerned officers and officials of R&B department have been also directed to keep men and machines in a state of preparedness to meet any eventuality in the wake of fresh snowfall in the district.

DC Shopian also said that the projects including those related to echo tourism taken up for execution would be completed in the given time.

Chief Secretary, B V R Subrahmanyam Monday chaired a meeting here to review the progress of the ongoing Digital India Land Records Modernization Programme (DILRMP) in the State.

DILRMP is an integrated programme aimed at modernizing land records to minimize the scope of land/property disputes and enhance transparency in land records maintenance system. It is 100% centrally funded with main components including computerization of all land records, mutations, digitization of maps and integration of textual and spatial data.

The meeting was attended by Principal Secretary, Finance, Financial Commissioner, Revenue, J&K, Commissioner Secretary, Revenue, Divisional Commissioner, Jammu, Secretary, IT, Commissioner, Survey & Land Records, J&K, other senior officers and representative of vendor M/S Ramtech Software Solutions Pvt Ltd.

Financial Commissioner, Revenue, J&K briefed the meeting about the progress achieved under the programme till 31st October, 2018. In the phase-1, Srinagar and Jammu districts have been taken up for implementation. In the 2nd phase 10 more districts and in the 3rd and final phase starting from April 2020 to March 2022, the remaining 10 Districts will be covered. The entire process in the State has been targeted to be completed by 31st March, 2022.

Giving details of the progress achieved under phase-1, Financial Commissioner, Revenue said that out of the 6.60 Crore Revenue documents and 55000 Revenue maps targeted to be scanned, 2.50 Crore Revenue documents and 45,000 Revenue maps have been scanned so far. As many as 1.30 Crore Revenue documents and 16000 Revenue Maps have also undergone Quality Check during the same period.

Financial Commissioner, Revenue, J&K further informed that 100% Revenue documents of Central Record Room Jammu have been scanned. However, he added that 100% scanning of Revenue documents in Central Record Room Srinagar will take some more time.

Chief Secretary asked Financial Commissioner, Revenue, J&K to work out a month and district wise work completion schedule in consultation with the vendor and ensure that the task of scanning the remaining 4 Crore Revenue documents and maps is completed by June 2019. He said 100% scanning of Revenue documents of Central Record Room Srinagar should receive focused attention throughout the coming months, as it forms the bulk of the work load i.e close to 2.5 Crore Revenue documents.

Chief Secretary also emphasized the need to ensure that State Data Centre to host permanent record of digitized Revenue documents is made fully operational by March, 2019.

Parts of south and north Kashmir received rains on Monday even as weatherman forecast possibility of snow amid fall in day temperature across the Kashmir Valley including this summer capital of the state.

The capital city registered the maximum temperature of 13.1 degree Celsius, down from 14.3 degree Celsius yesterday, a meteorological department official told GNS.

The famous skiing resort of Gulmarg in north Kashmir registered a maximum of 3.3 degrees Celsius against 9.4 degrees Celsius on Sunday last. He said the resort was the coldest place in the Valley had had traces of rains and snow.

Pahalgam in south Kashmir, which serves as a base camp for the annual Amarnath Yatra, recorded a maximum of 6.3 against yesterday’s 12.5 degrees Celsius. It received rainfall of 5.2mm from 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.

Kupwara, in north Kashmir, also received 5.2 mm of rain during the day and was third coldest place in the Valley, recording maximum of 7.2 against Sunday’s 14.2 degree Celsius.

Kokernag town in south Kashmir registered a maximum of 12.6 degree Celsius against 13.7 degrees Celsius on November 11, the official said.

He said Qazigund, the gateway town to Kashmir Valley, recorded day temperature of 16.2 degree Celsius, same as on Sunday.

He said there was the possibility of light to moderate rain/snow at most places in Kashmir and scattered places in Ladakh and Jammu region in next 24-hours.

Regarding the outlook for the subsequent two days, he said there is the possibility of “fairly widespread to widespread rain/snow” in Kashmir Valley.

As the weather remained cloudy, the weatherman here has predicted light to moderate rainfall across Kashmir on Tuesday and Wednesday, saying that the higher reaches may experience snowfall.

Talking to Kashmir News Service (KNS), Director Meteorological (MeT) department, Sonum Lotus said that there is possibility of light to moderate rainfall in the plains on Tuesday and Wednesday.

He said that the plains wouldn’t experience snowfall in between, saying that there is a forecast of light snowfall in higher reaches. “As pre the forecast, the weather would remain wet till November 14 and will improve from November 15 morning,” he said.

Lotus said that the snowfall in reaches will not be heavy as it occurred last week.

Earlier on October 27, the higher reaches as well plains in Kashmir here experienced season’s first snowfall that also resulted in the blockade of roads and especially affected the power supply across the Valley.

The four transmission towers in the Valley at Lissar, Kulgam, Shopian and Wanpoh got fully damaged in the snowfall, thereby left southern districts without electricity for days together.

Police on Monday said that it has busted an inter-state gang of fraudsters by arresting three persons involved in defrauding the innocent public of Udhampur and its surrounding areas on the pretext of being a “Tantrik” who can cure the life-consuming terminal diseases with his magic power.

Giving details, Rayees Mohammad Bhat, SSP Udhampur told GNS that based on some reliable information, police took the contingency of the fraud and a Case FIR No. 555/2018 U/S 420/406/380 RPC was registered in Police Station Udhampur.

During the course of the investigation, police succeeded in identifying the victims of these fraudsters who were motivated to assist the police to nab these fraudsters. Accordingly, a special police team led by Inspr. Sanjeev Chib, SHO PS Udhampur assisted by SI Vishavpartap Singh under the supervision of Zahid Saif Wani, Dy.SP Hqrs. Udhampur was constituted and a massive hunt was launched to nab these fraudsters by way of utilizing human and technical intelligence, SSP said.

“The raids have been conducted in various suspected locations and ultimately the police team arrested the accused gang of fraudsters red handed and subsequently all the 03 fraudsters were arrested and on their disclosure, cash recovery to the tune about 12 Lacs and stolen jewellery worth Rs. 60 thousand were recovered,” SSP said.

Modus operandi of these fraudsters was that they used to gain entry in a house on the pretext of being a “Tantrik” who can cure various diseases especially life consuming terminal diseases with their magic power and soon after gaining the entry in a house in this way, the gang led by Maan Singh son of Nagina Singh of Darhar, Tehsil Padrona, District Gorakhpur, Utter Pradesh and his associates namely Gouri Devi wife of Bala Deep of Jhansi, MP, Sachwinder Singh son of Charan Singh, Wamini, Gurdaspur, Punjab used to befool the house owners with the suspicion of availability of some hidden treasure/wealth etc. which they can trace after performing some special kind of rituals/pooja secretly, the officer said.

Accordingly, they used to collect money from the house owners for being used for pooja purpose so that the hidden wealth could be extracted and shifted in the household utensils by way of rituals. Besides, Maan Singh used to utilize many other ways which included fasting, performing rituals along with family members and sometimes alone inside the housekeeping all the family members out of the house etc. thereby committing thefts with a free hand from these houses, the officer said.

Moreover, Maan Singh used to warn the family members not to disclose about the treasure/hidden wealth their rituals/pooja to anyone during 41days of Pooja otherwise the whole exercise will go in vain and would be having adverse effects on the family. This way, the fraudsters cheated 03 families of district Udhampur besides committing thefts to the tune of about 18 Lacs approx. As of now, cash recovery of 12.03 Lacs and stolen jewellery worth Rs. 60 thousand has been made besides freezing of their bank account having the balance to the tune of Rs. 4 Lac. Further investigation of the case is going on, the officer added.