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AAP, BJP spar over House questions
New Delhi:
New Delhi:
Senior Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader and its MCD in-charge Durgesh Pathak on Thursday said the Bharatiya Janat (BJP) Party-ruled North Delhi Municipal Corporation has issued an “unconstitutional” circular according to which the mayor will decide which questions a councillor can raise in the House.
“The BJP-ruled North MCD mayor Jai Prakash has come up with a circular which noted that each and every councillor should submit their questions to the mayor before raising them in front of the House. The mayor is trying to make the MCD his own private company. This is the first time in the history of MCD and in the history of Indian democracy, such an undemocratic thing is happening,” said Pathak.
The AAP leader said that the north MCD is “scared” of the “constant grilling” by Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) councillors, who he claimed have been asking questions that exposed the deep corruption within the BJP-ruled civic body.
“Through these questions, AAP tried to bring transparency and fix accountability within the MCDs. We asked them about loans of MCD towards the contractors hired for advertisements. We asked them about regularisation of the sanitation workers and other contractual employees. We asked how much do they get as house tax from the big builders of Delhi,” he said.
Mayor Jai Prakash rejected AAP’s allegations as “baseless”.
“The circular doesn’t intend to discourage councillors from asking questions, but it’s a process to stop repetition of similar questions asked by multiple councillors. It was observed that many councillors ask the same questions during House meetings, which not only leads to waste of time but also wastes a lot of expenses in the form of stationery,” he said.
