Four AJK rest houses leased to private sector

MUZAFFARABAD, March 30: The AJK government has leased out four tourism department rest houses and lodges to private sector to reduce fiscal burden on the one hand and ensure provision of quality services to tourists on the other, Dawn has learnt. The tourism department owned more than 30 rest houses across the state but ironically the process of booking of room(s) as well as the standard of services in these facilities had been in total disarray due to a number of reasons, leaving a bad taste in the mouth of visitors. Every year, these facilities were eating up huge resources in shape of maintenance expenses and salaries of the employees. Last year, chief secretary Mohammad Shahzad Arbab decided to take the private sector on board in maintenance and operation of the rest houses and lodges on the basis of long-term leases. The tourism department published advertisements in October last year initially offering long-term lease of its nine rest houses in Muzaffarabad and Neelum districts. According to sources, five parties submitted their bids but only two were declared technically qualified by a committee. Of them, M/S Valley Lodges was approved for possession of a 26-room rest-houses in Karen, a 10-room rest house in Sharda, a seven-room rest house in Kuttan and a two-room anglers' hut inn Dawarian, all located in Neelum valley. A notification in this regard was, however, issued by the tourism department only recently after obtaining approval from Prime Minister Sardar Attique Ahmed Khan. According to sources, of these facilities only the Karen rest house was operational, whereas Sharda rest house was without electricity and water supply for the last five years; Dawarian hut was under occupation of a schoolteacher and Kutton rest house was without an independent access road. Interestingly, the only operational rest house in Karen was netting a paltry sum of Rs124,000 per year whereas its annual maintenance cost was Rs700,000. Salaries of the 19 employees in all the four facilities, to the tune of Rs1.1 million, were in addition to the annual maintenance costs, sources said. The successful bidder had pledged to make advance deposit of Rs603,000 as yearly rent of the four facilities besides payment of salaries of the staff placed on its disposal. However, sources said, the tourism department had decided to retain eight rooms of Karen and four rooms of Sharda with it. "How can be there two managements and two types of services on the premises of one unit," the private entrepreneur was reported to have asked the department with a request to review the decision. The term of lease, supposed to be at least 25 years, was also reduced to 15 years but that was not a big issue, according to the entrepreneur.