In Delhi, Kejriwal being punished for defeating Modi : Yashwant Sinha

Former BJP leader and the former Finance Minister of India Yashwant Sinha lashed out against ‘immature’ attitude of PM Modi towards the elected government of Delhi. The opinion comes from a BJP veteran during a time when Delhi CM and his six party colleagues are sitting on a Dharna at the Lieutenant Governor’s office. Yashwant Sinha said that Arvind Kejriwal was being punished for his party’s massive victory in Delhi where 67 out of 70 seats had been won by the AAP decimating the Modi wave in 2015 elections.

Yashwant Sinha considered the governance in Delhi as a diarchy where the powers are clearly defined. Delhi had been granted special status by inserting Article 239AA in Part VIII of the constitution through the 69th Constitutional Amendment Act of 1991. This amendment nullified the effect of Article 239 on Delhi and according to Article 239AA, Delhi was provided a legislative assembly, bestowed it with legislative powers and enjoined upon the Lieutenant Governor to act upon the aid and advice of the Council of Ministers.

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Anyhow Yashwant Sinha said that the entries 1,2, and 18 had been kept out of the purview of the Delhi Assembly which related to public order, police, and land. In a case of difference of opinion between the LG and the minister in charge of a department, the matter should be first referred to the Council of Ministers and if again there were differences in opinions, refer it to the President of India, said Sinha.

A former civil servant, Yashwant Sinha accused the Central Government of ‘illegally and fundamentally altering’ the constitutional amendment of 1991 through a notification dated May 21, 2015, soon after the AAP government assumed office. The Centre along with its vested powers on public order, police, and land, also intruded to snatch the complete control of “Services” in Delhi National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi. Thus, Sinha pointed out that the elected AAP Government in Delhi lost all control over all “Services” within its jurisdiction, including Class IV services! The elected Delhi Government had been reduced to a ‘joke’, said Sinha. The condition there was that even a peon can disobey a minister and the minister could not take any actions to discipline him!

The Delhi Government had taken the matter to the courts, where it was dismissed in the Delhi High Court after which they approached the Supreme Court. Supreme Court concluded the final hearing of the case on December 6, 2017, but has not issued the orders till now, even though as per the provisions the Court must deliver the order within 3 months of the final hearing.

Yashwant Sinha termed ‘unfortunate’ the spat between the ministers and Chief Secretary of Delhi at the residence of Delhi CM. This pestered for 5 months and gradually turned into a ‘trade union model’ strike by the civil servants which further culminated in Delhi CM and his colleagues’ Dharna at LG’s office.

Sinha brought into attention the incident when in 1998, Congress Party won the assembly elections in Delhi, Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s stand was more ‘mature’ than what Modi now has done to Arvind Kejriwal. During 2015 Delhi Assembly elections, Modi was the face of BJP and the message of the election was that Modi lost the elections to Kejriwal. Going through the words of Yashwant Sinha it seems that PM Narendra Modi has taken it as personal and he is taking the revenge for that now!

To avoid the current stalemate, Yashwant Sinha urged the Home Minister to call a meeting of the LG, Delhi CM, and the Chief Secretary and solve the issue of noncooperation by the bureaucracy with the elected government of Delhi without any further loss of time.

As a solution, he suggested that the Central Government should retain full control over the area within the jurisdiction of the New Delhi Municipal Corporation and administer it directly as a Union Territory with its own Administrator. He further said that the rest of the Capital Territory should be constituted into a full-fledged state of Delhi with all the powers of the state government.

He exhorted to go by the Chandigarh model or the American New York model of administration while stressing that Kejriwal was ‘paying price’ for defeating Modi in 2015.