Entrepreneurs Association Meets LG Ladakh, Lists Demands – Jammu Kashmir Latest News | Tourism

Entrepreneurs Association members during a meeting with LG of Ladakh RK Mathur in Leh on Wednesday.

Excelsior Correspondent
LEH, February 2: Lt. Governor, RK Mathur today gave a patient a listen to the issues raised by the Leh Ladakh Entrepreneurs Association headed by President Tonyot Tashi Chulichan, the Senior Executive Member of Dorjay Namgail Shangstot, Tsewang Dorjay Gasha, Treasure and Sonam Gyaltson Barzi, senior member this morning at Raj Niwas. Tonyot, on behalf of over 650 members of the Association, raised five main points related to the issues they are facing at the meeting.
He highlighted the glaring problem of the existence of an outdated 2012 SOR (Schedule of Rates) still used by the Rural Development Department (RDD) to carry out its work. This is in big difference to the way PWD operates according to their updated SoR, 2020 from J&K, and it is being revised and adapted to the UT structure, he said.
Moreover, Tonyot referred to the current phase of uncertainty among Ladakh-based entrepreneurs due to bigger companies taking over the conventional projects, usually undertaken by them, in the UT scenario. This, he said, is very damaging to the morale of individual entrepreneurs in particular and an unhealthy trend is emerging with potential long-term socio-economic ramifications.
In this regard, he sought the intervention of LG to seriously engage entrepreneurs in Ladakh and evolve ways such as encouraging a Joint Venture (JV) approach for entrepreneurs to work with larger companies and so to gain experience to improve their experience level in the future.
Tonyot requested that experience of ‘all kinds of civil works‘ be considered for now when applying to participate in tenders launched by existing operational organizations in Ladakh like CPWD, NPCC, NHPC, PWD, PMGSY, WABCOS, NHIDCL, etc. He pointed out that Ladakh-based contractors have a unique experience of working in the high altitude conditions of Ladakh, which must be taken into account when defining guidelines for participation in tenders.
The meeting was fruitful as LG listened to them with great interest and attention, and assured that solutions to the problems would be found soon.
The Lieutenant Governor very generously extended the scheduled meeting time from 15 minutes to 45 minutes to discuss other things like PMGSY.CRF, new projects, BADP and Kumbh Mela funds. All long-pending dues were also lifted and authorizations were urgently requested. The contractors have called for the EMD to be “once fixed” for which experience of “any type of civil works” is sufficient to participate in tenders issued under this project.

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