Delhi CM-LG tussle persists, but both agree to restart meets

Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which runs the Union government to which Saxena reports, held street protests on Monday, days after their councillors came to blows in the municipal council house

A letter war broke out on Monday between lieutenant governor (LG) VK Saxena and chief minister Arvind Kejriwal over the appointment of 10 nominated members and a presiding officer in the Municipal Corporation of Delhi.

In a letter to Arvind Kejriwal on Monday, lieutenant governor VK Saxena asked the CM to fix a meeting with him to iron out differences between the two over various governance issues including the municipal appointments. Kejriwal shot back a letter, urging the LG to have a public discussion on the issues. (ANI)

Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which runs the Union government to which Saxena reports, held street protests on Monday, days after their councillors came to blows in the municipal council house.

In a letter to Kejriwal on Monday, the LG asked the CM to fix a meeting with him to iron out differences between the two over various governance issues including the municipal appointments. Kejriwal shot back a letter, urging the LG to have a public discussion on the issues. Kejriwal, who has written third letter to the LG in last few days, also flagged “sarcastic remarks by the LG in his letter”.

“In the beginning of your letter, you have sarcastically mentioned “…you have started taking governance in the city seriously…” after my election campaigns (in other states and for the MCD). “AAP is a national party and as its national convener, I have to attend to elections campaigns in different parts of the country. Hon’ble Prime Minister, Hon’ble home minister and many BJP chief ministers like Yogi Adityanath ji, Shivraj Singh ji, Pushkar Dhami ji etc were also campaigning for their party at that time in Gujarat and Delhi,” Kejriwal stated.

The CM and the LG have had several run-ins since May 26, 2022, when Saxena took over as the LG and a jurisdiction battle broke out between the two.

The elected government has accused the LG of bypassing the elected government and called it against the constitutional provisions, while the LG office has maintained that the appointments were according to constitutional provisions and the AAP was creating confusion with deliberate attempts to mislead people.

The CM and LG used to meet every Friday to discuss governance and administrative issues. In his new letter, Saxena urged Kejriwal to resume the meetings, but not without taking apparent jabs over what he said was the CM’s “preoccupation” with the election campaigns.

In his letter Kejriwal said he will fix a meeting with the LG, but added that Saxena must make his view clear on an “important discussion (that) has started in the last few days”. This, the CM said, had to do with Saxena’s stand that the LG had the authority to appoint the MCD members whose selections triggered the chaos last week. Saxena cited the cited the legal definitions that say “administrator/LG” will appoint to assume that right to do so.

“Sir… kindly make your stand public whether this was your position that from now onwards, on all those subjects where the law uses the words ‘administrator/LG’ elected government would be bypassed/ignored and LG would directly deal with the officers and directly run those departments? For instance, all laws and acts related to electricity, health, water, education etc - all define government as ‘administrator/LG’. So, does it mean that from now on, the power department, education department, health department, water department etc - all these will be directly run by you?” Kejriwal asked.

No response was available from the LG office on the letter written by CM Kejriwal.