MCD first meet in limbo, Delhi mayor seeks status check

Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) Shelly Oberoi was elected as the mayor of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) last week. A senior MCD official said that, on Monday, 16 departments were asked to give detailed presentations this week

The Delhi civic body’s newly elected mayor has sought reports from key departments on their work over the last three years, and the status of ongoing projects and future proposals, senior municipal officials said, even as the dispute over election of members of a key committee lingers.

Officials said that there was no clarity if policy decisions could be taken amid the standing committee elections crisis. (Raj K Raj/HT PHOTO)

Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) Shelly Oberoi was elected as the mayor of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) last week

A senior MCD official said that, on Monday, 16 departments were asked to give detailed presentations this week.

The sanitation department will be outlining its current challenges, projects being undertaken to address the garbage problem, and the scope of work already awarded the contractors, the official added.

Cleaning Delhi’s garbage mounds is one of the key promises made by the AAP in run-up to the municipal polls last year.

After being elected as mayor last Wednesday, Oberoi said that, despite getting a short tenure, she will work on the 10 promises made by chief minister Arvind Kejriwal. Oberoi said that she will start by inspecting the three landfills — Okhla, Bhalswa and Ghazipur. But the ongoing crisis over the standing committee elections and the arrest of deputy CM Manish Sisodia in the excise policy case has prevented that.

A second official said that mayor has asked for details of health trade licenses issued to eateries, hotels and restaurants, and the conditions imposed on traders by the health wing.

Another official said that the engineering wing will submit details of ongoing projects involving expenditure of more than ₹1 crore, and the status of pending cases over last three years. Similarly, the education department has been directed to provide details about the list of NGOs attached with it and the scope of their work, the third official said. The other departments in the exercise include horticulture, toll tax, veterinary, law and IT department, he added.

Uncertainty over the policy making

Meanwhile, several senior civic officials said that was still no clarity if formal House meetings and policy decisions could be taken unless the Delhi high court resolves the crisis over the standing committee election to mark the completion of the inaugural meeting.

On Saturday, the Delhi high court stayed the re-election to six members of the MCD’s standing committee scheduled for February 27. It also issued notices to lieutenant governor VK Saxena and Oberoi to file their responses to the petitions for a hearing that will now take place on March 22 next month.

The stay over the re-election has put the corporation in a unique legal position, senior municipal officials said. “The first inaugural meeting of MCD as stipulated in the DMC act is still not complete. The minutes of the meeting for the meeting held on Wednesday-Thursday and Friday have not been confirmed as the third agenda item on the list in the form of standing committee elections remain pending. Under such a situation, a next meeting cannot be called,” an official said.

The policymaking work will suffer if such a state continues over the next month, the official added.

A second official from municipal secretariat said that the corporation still needs to pass the budget for the next financial year 2023-24 before March 31, 2023. “The schedule of taxes may have been cleared by the special officer on February 15 but rest of the budget is still pending. We are now in a situation that there is no special officer while the corporation is not fully functional,” the official said.

In absence of the standing committee, the mayor also holds the power to grant anticipatory approvals to proposals put up before her by the executive wing. But each decision will have to ultimately ratified by the Standing Committee sooner or later.