Delhi MCD polls: AAP hopes to win more control over city admin
As several services rendered by the Delhi government and the MCD overlap, such as basic education and health care, the AAP hopes to stamp its complete authority over the administration of Delhi with its government in the civic body.
Ever since its emergence on Delhi’s electoral scene in 2013, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has dominated in the three assembly elections held since. Emerging as the single largest party in 2013 and achieving unprecedented success in 2015 and 2020 assembly polls, the AAP is now hoping to repeat its success in the MCD elections.
In 2017 -- the only civic elections that the AAP has faced so far -- the party won 48 of the 272 wards with a vote share of 26.23%. In 2015 assembly elections, the AAP had won 67 of the 70 seats, delegating the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which won the remaining three seats, to the margins and decimating the Congress. The BJP, however, won its third straight term in the MCD in 2017.
As several services rendered by the Delhi government and the MCD overlap, such as basic education and health care, the AAP hopes to stamp its complete authority over the administration of Delhi with its government in the civic body. A win would earn the party greater control over the state where several key aspects of governance such as land, law and order and services are under the Lieutenant Governor.
A victory will also help the AAP to galvanise its political reach further by laying out some of its good programmes concerning education and health to facilities that are governed by the MCD. The party has pitched “Kejriwal ki sarkar, Kejriwal ka parshad” (Kejriwal’s government and Kejriwal’s councillor) to the people, promising faster and better development of the city if it governs both the state and the MCD.
Propelled by a victory in Punjab assembly election earlier this year, the AAP is planing to achieve a national footprint, and it expects that the momentum will help it win a greater say in Delhi’s administration with a win in the MCD polls.
The party has promised to make Delhi garbage-free, clean, and beautiful, as well as to end corruption by making building plan processes online and regularise minor alterations done to properties through one-time penalties among the “Kejriwal ki 10 guarantees” announced on November 11, in the run up to the polls.
If the party scores a win in the elections, the first challenge it will have to deal with is rectifying management of solid waste and clearing the three landfills in the city. The three mountains of garbage, one each in Ghazipur, Okhla and Bhalswa, have been at the centre of the AAP’s campaign for the MCD. Removal of the millions of tonnes of the legacy waste and stopping fresh dumping at the landfills is a major challenge since initiatives to segregate waste at source and promoting recycling have not taken off.
Improving parks, schools and hospitals that are under the civic body, fixing parking and checking illegal constructions are some other major challenges that will test the AAP which takes pride in its ‘Delhi Model’ of governance.