Mayors of the three BJP-ruled municipal corporations in Delhi today met President Pranab Mukherjee and sought his intervention for release of funds and implementation of the recommendations of the Fourth Delhi Finance Commission by the AAP government.
The three mayors -- Harshdeep Malhotra (EDMC), Subhash Arya (SDMC) and Ravinder Gupta (NDMC) led by Delhi BJP president Satish Upadhyay apprised the President of the financial crisis faced by the civic bodies, claiming the situation was aggravated by Delhi government's "dilly dallying" in paying funds under the Third Delhi Finance Commission and implementation of recommendations of the 4th DFC.
"We told the President that Delhi government is violating the fundamental spirit of 74th Constitutional Amendment Act by weakening the three municipal corporations," Upadhyay said.
The danger of strike is looming due to inability of the civic bodies to pay their employees timely and the situation was worsened by funds withheld by the government and non implementation of the recommendations of the 4th Finance Commission, the delegation said to the President while urging his interference in the matter.
"In case of strike by sanitation workers, unhygienic conditions will prevail in the city and the people will suffer without their fault," Upadhyay said.
East Delhi Mayor Harshdeep Malhotra said the President heard them "patiently" as they urged him to intervene and ensure that people of Delhi do not suffer due lack of funds and resultant collapse of civic services.
"We explained that the rider of Delhi government in implementing the recommendations of the 4th DFC was wrong since a commission constituted by it can not make binding suggestions to the Centre.
"So, Delhi government's rider that it will implement recommendations of the commission after its suggestions were obeyed by Centre were nothing but delaying tactics," Malhotra claimed.
The erstwhile unified Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) was trifurcated in 2012 into -- North Delhi (NDMC), East Delhi (EDMC) and South Delhi (SDMC) corporations.
