MCDs did not get grant from Centre due to corruption in Delhi BJP, alleges AAP

Senior AAP leader and the party’s MCD in-charge Durgesh Pathak said the Union government has “accepted that the Delhi BJP is completely corrupt”.

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Tuesday said the Centre did not give a single penny in the Union Budget 2021-22 to the three cash-strapped Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-ruled municipal corporations in Delhi because it has “lost confidence” in the Delhi BJP and the party’s leaders.

“Yesterday, the BJP government at the Centre left the MCDs high and dry with zero allocation against their demand of Rs.12,000 crores,” Pathak said. (Image via Twitter)

Addressing a press conference, senior AAP leader and the party’s MCD in-charge Durgesh Pathak said the Union government has “accepted that the Delhi BJP is completely corrupt”. Pathak said the MCD mayors and Delhi BJP leaders earlier met Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman and urged her to release a grant but received nothing.

“Yesterday, the BJP government at the Centre left the MCDs high and dry with zero allocation against their demand of Rs.12,000 crores. The employees of the BJP-ruled MCDs, along with the citizens of Delhi, expected that in this budget the BJP government would provide some aid to the MCD. The BJP has been ruling the MCD for the last 15 years and the reason behind no allocation for the MCD is BJP’s own Delhi unit. The saffron party’s central leadership has lost all faith in its Delhi unit,” Pathak said.

The Delhi BJP said the AAP is “concocting stories” to divert public attention from the fact that the Delhi government is not paying constitutional funds that constitutionally due to the three MCDs.

“Central government gives municipal bodies funds as per Niti Aayog’s recommendations. Also, Delhi does not figure in the list of Union Territories eligible for direct grants to its municipal corporations. This is the reason why the Centre has not given a direct grant to MCDs,” said Delhi BJP spokesperson Praveen Shankar Kapoor.

“It will be better if instead of issuing misleading statements on municipal funds, Pathak asks chief minister Arvind Kejriwal to clear all pending dues of the three MCDs,” Kapoor said.

Pathak also alleged that the Centre has reduced allocation for local bodies across India.

“Earlier, the Centre used to pay the local bodies on the basis of ₹428 per person of their population. But now, it has come down to ₹206. Gurugram has received ₹200 crores, Ghaziabad received ₹200 crores, Lucknow also got the same amount. Gurugram and Ghaziabad are situated on the borders of Delhi and Lucknow is just around five hours drive from the capital. The BJP government has provided aids to the local bodies of these cities but not to Delhi,” he said.

“It is significant that leaders of Delhi BJP and mayors of the MCDs met Sitharaman and minister of state for finance Anurag Thakur to demand grants. But, despite their demands, the BJP-led central government has not provided a single penny to the MCD,” Pathak said.