‘Showed Delhi L-G various court rulings, but…’: Arvind Kejriwal after meeting VK Saxena

Citing the 2018 Supreme Court judgment on transferred subjects, Arvind Kejriwal said “various orders of the L-G are illegal”.

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday alleged that Lieutenant Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena told him that he can ask for any file since he is the "administrator" and claimed that Saxena returned a proposal to send government teachers to Finland for training, asking them to do a cost-benefit analysis of the programme first.

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and Lieutenant Governor Vinai Kumar Saxen. (ANI file)

Addressing a press conference, Kejriwal said the L-G twice returned a file (containing the proposal) to send Delhi government teachers to Finland for training, asking if a cost-benefit analysis of the programme has been done.

"I told him that a soldier lays down his life for the country but merely gets a salary of ₹50,000 to ₹60,000. Have we ever done a cost-benefit analysis of a soldier's life? We are shaping the future of our children here. We are building a nation. I spend my entire salary on my children. You cannot do cost-benefit analysis of certain things," he said.

Citing the 2018 Supreme Court judgment on transferred subjects, Kejriwal said “various orders of the L-G are illegal”.

“ The Delhi L-G said he can ask for any file since he is the 'administrator'. I showed him various court decisions but he said his power is supreme,” Kejriwal alleged after his meeting with Saxena earlier on Friday.

“Various departments have stopped payments of the Delhi government. This was done three months before the MCD poll to hurt the AAP,” Kejriwal added.

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) also staged a protest outside Saxena's residence over his alleged objections to the city government's proposal of sending teachers to Finland for training.

The protest was led by senior party leader Atishi.

The Raj Niwas had earlier in the day clarified that the L-G has not rejected any proposal for a Delhi government teachers' training programme in Finland and any statement to the contrary is “misleading and mischievously motivated”.

The L-G has only advised the Delhi government to evaluate the proposal in totality and assess the effectiveness of such foreign training programmes undertaken in the past, it said.

The series of tweets by the L-G come in the wake of deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia's allegation condemning the alleged refusal for the training programme. Sisodia had on January 12 said the restrictions on such training by the L-G is an attack on education.

As per a Delhi Government release, the State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT) has planned to send two groups of 30 teachers to Jyvaskyla University in Finland in December 2022 and March 2023. The 5-day training program is meant for primary in-charges of Delhi government schools and teacher educators of SCERT. Under this, SCERT has made a budget provision in its annual plan and SCERT has been given a grant in aid by the Delhi government for conducting such training programmes.

Jyvaskyla University is Finland's top university, an international centre of excellence and among the top 40 universities in the world in the 2019 Academic Ranking of World Universities.

The L-G returned the proposal to send a batch of teachers to Finland in December, questioning the credentials of the institution imparting training and whether guidelines were being followed, the AAP leader alleged.

"When we answered his queries, he asked for a cost-benefit analysis and if such a programme can be done in India," Sisodia claimed, adding, "The prime minister and chief ministers of BJP-ruled states will go to the World Economic Forum. Will that also be stopped on the pretext of cost-benefit analysis?"

Saxena has also directed for the removal of the Delhi government's nominees on the boards of BSES discoms BRPL and BYPL for their appointments being "grossly illegal", news agency PTI reported citing L-G office sources.

Saxena has directed for the replacement of the "private individuals" appointed as nominees to the boards of BRPL and BYPL with senior government officers.

Saxena has reportedly taken the decision on the basis of an inquiry report submitted to him by the power department and the chief secretary, following a complaint on September 26, 2022.

(With inputs from PTI, ANI)