In the composite ranking of the first ever District Good Governance Index (DGGI), Jammu district has emerged at the top, followed by districts of Doda, Samba, Pulwama and Srinagar in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir, officials said.

The DGGI, virtually released by Union Home Minister Amit Shah, is a framework document comprising performance under 10 governance sectors having 58 indicators with 116 data points.

The criteria have been adopted after following a rigorous and robust process of data collection, screening and validation by each of the districts.

The governance sectors, the performance of which was weighed under this index, includes Agriculture and Allied (11 indicators), Commerce and Industry (five), Human Resource Development (nine), Public Health (nine), Public Infrastructure and Utilities (six), Social Welfare and Development (six), Financial Inclusion (three), Judiciary and Public Safety (four), Environment (two) and Citizen Centric Governance (three).

Under individual categories, Kishtwar district in Jammu region has been rated top in agriculture sector, Jammu in two sectors of C&I and Citizen Centric Governance, Pulwama in HRD, Reasi in Public Health, Srinagar in Public Infrastructure, Ramban in Social Welfare, Ganderbal in Financial Inclusion, Doda in Judicial and Public Safety and Shopian in Environment.

In the overall ranking, Ganderbal district in central Kashmir stands at 6th place, Anantnag at 7th, Baramulla at 8th place, followed by Kathua (9th), and Kupwara at 10th place.

The last 10 districts in the index include Kishtwar at the 11th spot followed by districts of Budgam, Udhampur, Reasi, Bandipora, Ramban, Kulgam, Shopian, Poonch and Rajouri which were at the bottom of the index in the composite ranking.

The booklet states DGGI as a tool to assess the status of governance and impact of various interventions taken up by the districts and UT administration.

It says that the index would provide a framework to assess the performance of the districts in specific sectors and provide useful information to the districts enabling them to formulate and implement suitable strategies to improve ease-of-living and service delivery.

The ranking of the districts, has been said, would bring about healthy competition amongst them from which the citizens would be immensely benefited.

The Department of Administrative Reforms and Public Grievances (DARPG) has been guiding and providing financial support for the exercise with technical support extended by CGG, Hyderabad.

The J&K Institute of Management for Public Administration and Rural Development (IMPARD) with active collaboration of Directorate of Economics and Statistics (DES) were the pivotal agencies in developing this index for the UT, the official said.

Shah slammed

Political parties in Jammu and Kashmir reacted to Union minister Amit Shah's remarks on Saturday that the union territory's statehood would be restored once the situation gets normal, saying this statement is self-contradictory and goes against the good governance claim made by the Centre.

"After quite literally terrorising people of Jammu and Kashmir into silence to create a false normalcy narrative, GoI's admission that situation still isn't normal is self contradictory. Also proves that silence shouldn't be misconstrued as normalcy," PDP president and former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti wrote on Twitter.

Shah said assembly elections in J-K will be held after completion of the ongoing delimitation process and statehood will be restored once situation in the union territory becomes normal.

Virtually releasing India's first "District Good Governance Index", he said J-K is a priority for Prime Minister Narendra Modi and multipronged efforts are being made for the all round development of the union territory.

Reacting to Shah's remarks, Peoples Conference chief Sajad Lone asked who will define normalcy.

"Who will define normalcy? And in a federal structure, can we really use normalcy as an excuse to assume power. Irrespective of the definition of normalcy, possibly coined by the union government, every single stateless day is an affront to federalism and to the people of J&K," Lone said on Twitter.

He said "non-popular" governments mean a "humiliating existence" for the inhabitants of that particular place.

"And to the people of India who are mute bystanders, Inshallah you too will one day taste statelessness and helplessness. We don't wish it for even on our worst enemies (sic)," Lone said.

The People's Conference chairman said the central rule in any place is a "kick in the teeth for federalism".

"And self-styled pat on the back, oh, doing so well, this is all so nauseating," he added.

CPI(M) leader M Y Tarigami said the people of the Union territory were being denied the right of participation and representation which was one of the fundamental principles of good governance.

"One of the principle fundamentals of good governance is participation and representation, a right which continues to be denied to the people of Jammu and Kashmir.

Releasing such indexes is intended to help the government in optics-wise," he said.

Tarigami said the "ground reality" of dilapidated roads, erratic power supply, inaccessibility of portable water combined with huge unemployment, social unrest is reflecting the "contrasting picture".

Reacting to the good governance claim made by the Centre in J-K, Jammu and Kashmir Pradesh Congress Committee (JKPCC) termed it as "hollow and misleading".

The party also questioned the Union home minister's claim of restoring statehood to J-K and said how long the issue will be put in backburner "aiming to divert the attention from the real issues".

"J-K has suffered immensely on every front, which is indicative of the unutilized allocation of developmental funds in J-K. J-K has surrendered almost 50 per cent of the developmental funds, which could not be spent due to the delayed decision and wrong policies on account of the so-called development in J-K," JKPCC president Ghulam Ahmad Mir said.

Mir said there was "huge disconnect" between the bureaucracy and the common people.

"Congress party strongly contests the claims of the good governance and understands that it was a tool to hide the failed policies and the losses caused to J-K post its downgrading," he said.

Mir also expressed deep concern over the "delay" in delimitation process and said the people as well as political parties in J-K believe that the process is being delayed to buy time.

He said the government must give timeline as to when the process of delimitation is completed.

The JKPCC president said it was astonishing to observe that on the one hand, the Centre claims to have normalised the situation and on the other hand, it makes another claim in same breath that statehood will be restored after the situation was back to normal.

"This is indicative of contradiction within the system. The Govt of India must clear its position and tell the people as to when the statehood will be restored to the people of J-K," he said.

Meanwhile, National Conference (NC) termed the release of 'Good Governance Index' for 20 J-K districts as part of governments' efforts to "hide its failures" on creation of employment opportunities and bridging development deficit in J-K.

Noing that 'good governance' in J-K was confined to papers only, party spokesperson Imran Nabi Dar said the ground situation "belies" all the claims of the administration.

"All that is being claimed by the government in terms of transforming the region in terms of development, infrastructure augmentation and employment generation is nowhere to be seen by the people of Jammu and Kashmir to this day," he said.