SRINAGAR: J&K Legislative Assembly Speaker Abdul Rahim Rather on Thursday pulled up Transport Minister Satish Sharma over the use of multiple official vehicles by officers holding charge of more than one department, stressing that the government could not afford such expenditure.
The issue came up during Question Hour after BJP MLA R.S. Pathania sought to know whether the government had enforced, or proposed to enforce, a “One Officer, One Vehicle” ceiling across departments, PSUs, boards and autonomous bodies to prevent officers from retaining multiple official vehicles.
Replying to the question, Sharma informed the House that there was currently no specific government policy prescribing a uniform ceiling for the allotment or retention of official vehicles by individual officers across J&K government departments.
However, he said a Revised Car Policy was under consideration and proposed to introduce the principle of “One Vehicle-One Officer”. The proposed policy would also provide for exceptions based on security requirements, field duties, additional assignments, operational exigencies and the functional requirements of particular departments and organisations.
Sharma said the policy, once approved, would be implemented across the concerned departments, PSUs, boards and autonomous bodies, with the objective of rationalising government vehicles and ensuring optimum utilisation of available resources.
Intervening after the minister’s reply, Speaker Rather questioned the progress made by the government, noting that a high-level committee had reportedly been constituted on September 1.
“You said that a high-level committee has been constituted in the matter on September 1, 2026. Tell me what have you done in these 24 days. Why are you delaying the process? Will you take another two months to resolve the matter?” the Speaker asked, directing the minister to inform the House about the action taken.
Sharma assured the House that he would submit a detailed action-taken report, describing the matter as a “legacy issue”.
The Speaker, however, stressed that a legacy practice could not continue merely because it had existed for a long time.
“What if the legacy issue is followed wrongly, will you continue it? Inform the House in the ongoing session with your action-taken report,” Rather said.
