Delhi MCD polls: For BJP, housing for poor a key poll plank

According to Delhi BJP chief Adesh Gupta, no government has been able to provide the Capital’s slum residents with housing for the past four decades.

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders on Sunday said they hoped the allotment of flats to slum residents of Kalkaji Extension’s Bhoomiheen Camp by Prime Minister Narendra Modi will provide a fillip to the party’s prospects ahead of the municipal election scheduled for December 4.

Leader of Opposition in Delhi Legislative Assembly Ramvir Singh Bidhuri with Delhi Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief Adesh Gupta and party leader Harsh Vardhan flags off the campaigning vehicles for the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) elections, as Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas Hardeep Singh Puri and Union Minister of State for External Affairs Minister Meenakashi Lekhi look on, at Delhi party office, in New Delhi on Monday. (ANI Photo)

They added that in-situ rehabilitation for slum residents will be a key election issue for the party, as it plans to inform people how the Modi-led central government has delivered on its “Jahan Jhuggi, Wahan Makan” promise, while the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has allegedly failed to do so.

According to Delhi BJP chief Adesh Gupta, no government has been able to provide the Capital’s slum residents with housing for the past four decades. “However, the Modi government has delivered on its promise. Well-ventilated, multi-storeyed flats have been allotted to people to help them live with dignity in a safe and hygienic environment.”

Training his guns at Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, who also promised in-situ rehabilitation for slum residents in Delhi in his poll manifesto for the 2020 assembly elections, Gupta said, “For the past decade, close to 40,000 flats have been constructed in Narela and other parts of the city under the Rajiv Awas Yojana. But these are lying vacant--the Kejirwal government is not allotting it to poor people.”

Meanwhile, the BJP is organising trips for slum residents of other municipal wards to the newly inaugurated housing complex at Kalkaji Extension. Delhi BJP vice-president Sunil Yadav, who contested against Kejriwal in 2020 assembly elections, said, “We have asked all district presidents and party workers to show these flats to people from other slum clusters in Delhi. People from Vasant Kunj and other south Delhi wards visited yesterday (Saturday). Today (Sunday), slum residents from Moti Nagar assembly constituency and Mehrauli came to see the flats. This way they will get to know what the Modi government has done for them.”

Yadav said that arrangements for tea and food were made at Kalkaji Extension, and party workers were asked to arrange buses or other transport to get people to the site.

“This is a huge step by the Centre. This has given people hope that they too can get a flat. We will reach out to people and tell them that while other parties have only promised, we have delivered,” said Abhay Verma, BJP MLA from Laxmi Nagar and Delhi BJP spokesperson.

The in-situ rehabilitation project at Kalkaji Extension, which is being executed in a phased manner by the Delhi Development Authority, was conceived in 2011 and the foundation stone was laid by the then chief minister of Delhi, Sheila Dikshit. After coming to power in Delhi in 2015, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) released the Delhi Slum and JJ Cluster Rehabilitation and Relocation Policy, 2015, which focused on in-situ rehabilitation for slum residents.

According to Census 2011, 10.77% of Delhi’s population lives in slum clusters. Of the 675 slum clusters in Delhi, 376 are on DDA and central government land.

Ahead of the 2020 polls, the Centre released the PM-UDAY scheme to give ownership rights to residents of Delhi’s 1,731 unauthorised colonies. The BJP won just eight assembly seats in 2020, while the AAP won the remaining 62.