Game of politics: Sealing drive in Delhi is showing no signs of ending

No one wants to accept their mistakes. Where are the statesmen when you need them?

Trying to understand what is happening in Delhi is like wading in a sea of abbreviations. Three zones of the MCD (Municipal Corporation of Delhi) are engaged in strictly implementing the MPD (Master Plan of Delhi) on the orders of the SC (Supreme Court) which has told the DDA (Delhi Development Authority) it has been remiss in ignoring encroachment and has not developed LAPs (Local Area Plans) and a clear policy on FARs (Floor Area Ratio): something that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and Congress (I) have got together to criticise. And the Lieutenant Governor (LG) is not listening.

So everything should be crystal clear, right? Actually, for our purposes two words explain the whole problem: Greed; and fear.

No city can ever know in advance how big it is going to become. So planners create master plans and push development according to the master plan.

Except that in Delhi, while master plans existed, so did many greedy people. So though the DDA existed for precisely that purpose — the development of Delhi — the MCDs which were elected bodies, were supposed to regulate (along with DDA) the growth of business and residential establishments so that the development of Delhi was orderly. What the two should have done is ruthlessly punished deviations from the master plan, like they do in Chandigarh. Instead, not only was the master plan ignored but a proactive policy never adopted on the vertical growth of establishments. Entrepreneurs and home and land owners quickly moved in wherever they spotted real estate demand and opportunity and residential areas became offices, shops, showrooms and supermarkets putting enormous strain on shared facilities like roads, water, power, etc.

Add to that, a now-on now-off policy on street vendors and roadside eateries — and Delhi was ready to become a filthy, crowded, stinking landmass heaving with business, but just unliveable.

The SC took cognizance of this and set up a Supreme Court Empowered Monitoring Committee. This committee identified lapses that the MCD was asked to correct. So while earlier MCD and DDA had just looked the other way when houseowners turned their living rooms into car showrooms, now they were forced to start sealing residential areas where illegal business activity was being conducted.

Now, comes the politics. Today, majority of the MCDs are run by the BJP. The central government is the BJP’s. So the BJP doesn’t really know what to do — should it run the risk of earning the ire of traders who are using residential premises for business in the absence of any clear policy? Or sit back and say the whole policy is wrong and that they will craft another one?

Anecdotal evidence suggests Delhi’s trader sector employs 30 per cent of Delhi’s workforce and is the single largest contributor to Delhi’s GDP. The development of counter-magnets — habitations that could draw the working population away from Delhi into other areas — has not really taken place. The way to deal with the problem is to put politics aside and hammer out a policy that everyone agrees on, and then put it into practice, forgiving past lapses.

Except that when Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal called for an all party meeting as the crisis over sealing of buildings mounted over December, January and February, the chief of Delhi’s BJP unit, Manoj Tiwari {(a Bhojpuri singer whose most famous song was ‘Jiya ho Bihar ke lala’ (long live the son of Bihar)} went off to Mauritius on a study tour. What could he do? The BJP is in power in the MCDs, and he is among the seven MPs from Delhi. The BJP leadership has failed to convince people that it has been taking concrete steps to save the properties of  Delhiites from being sealed. A similar sealing drive 12 years ago had ensured Congress’ defeat in the 2007 municipal polls. It could be the BJP this time. On the other hand, the Congress has done little to cover itself in glory. And AAP is in the vortex of an apology storm, amid fears that the loss of 20 MLAs (who could be disqualified any day) might lead to serious instability.

The two Houses of Parliament have done no meaningful work for the last two weeks. The Law Minister is engaged in issuing threats to Mark Zuckerberg. The Home Minister and LG are rattling the cage. When it bursts, Delhi’s anger will be terrible to behold. Where are the statesmen when you need them?