Kejriwal says will rescue Delhi's agitated trash collectors

Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal addressed the city’s garbage collection workers on Monday, promising money from the city government to the bankrupt municipal corporations to pay their salary arrears, the reason for their strike action.

The three elected municipal bodies in the city are run by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), as is the Centre. Kejriwal and his Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) run the Delhi government, though which money is routed from the Centre to the civic bodies. The CM has said he’s not responsible for the mess, created by the BJP-run administrations.

Lashing at the “mismanagement” of the BJP-controlled civic bodies, he told the workers that from next month, they should protest in front of central government ministers’ homes.

He said he’d be meeting Union finance minister Arun Jaitley on Tuesday to urge him to ensure release of funds for the workers, while saying his government would give Rs 500 crore to the North and East Delhi Municipal Corporations.

“We pay Rs 1.31 lakh crore to the Centre every year and get nothing in return,” he charged. Adding that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had given more money to Mongolia than was due to the sanitation workers.

Kejriwal and his ministers underscored that it was the AAP-led government that was helping the workers, not the BJP, which “stole all the money”.    

Jung appoints new ACB chief

On Monday, Lt Governor (L-G) Najeeb Jung appointed an officer of his own choice to head the city government’s Anti-Corruption Branch (ACB), in place of the one chosen by the Arvind Kejriwal government. The issue had been a point of tussle between the L-G, the Centre’s monitor, and the Kejriwal government. The Centre and the LG- had asserted the ACB’s functioning was not part of the elected government’s ambit, and that officer postings needed the L-G’s okay. The matter is in court.