“In 1997, the BJP CM in Delhi also appointed a Parliamentary Secretary. The Congress also did so during Sheila (Dikshit) ji’s time. Then it was right?” Kejriwal told a news conference.
“When the BJP used to have Parliamentary Secretaries then it’s legal but when we do it, it’s illegal… I want to request Modiji, do whatever you want to me but don’t let the people of Delhi suffer,” the CM said.
President Pranab Mukherjee refused to sign a Bill that allowed 21 AAP MLAs to hold a second paying position as Parliamentary Secretary, officials said on Monday.
The Constitution prohibits legislators or parliamentarians from holding any positions with monetary or other benefits. This clause — known as office of profit — is aimed at reducing conflict-of-interest situations for public representatives.
Rashtrapati Bhavan sources said the Union Home and Law Ministries told the President the Delhi government Bill — allowing the MLAs’ appointment as Parliamentary Secretaries and exempting them from office-of-profit regulations retrospectively – violated existing laws.
On Wednesday, the AAP earlier termed as “purely political” the refusal of assent to the Bill, saying it was part of the BJP’s ploy to trouble the Delhi government as Prime Minister Narendra Modi was “scared” of Kejriwal. Taking the names of former Chief Ministers, Kejriwal said BJP leader Sahib Singh Verma appointed a legislator, Nand Kishore Garg, as Parliamentary Secretary in 1997.
Kejriwal said his own predecessor Sheila Dikshit had appointed Ajay Maken, now the president of the Congress party in Delhi, as her Parliamentary Secretary when she was the Chief Minister.
Mukesh Sharma (the then Congress MLA) and Prahlad Singh Sawhney (the then Congress MLA) were made Parliamentary Secretaries by the then Delhi government headed by Dikshit. There were three Parliamentary Secretaries in 1953 — namely HKL Bhagat, Shanta Vashit and Shiv Charan Dasgupta.
The fact has been corroborated in the letter from the records of the Delhi Legislative Assembly. If the appointment of these three were ‘fair & legal’ appointment for the then Congress government, why is the Congress party now making a farce cry over the Parliamentary Secretaries appointed by the AAP Government,” Kejriwal said. He tweeted: “Modi is only scared of AAP. He sees AAP everywhere — in the morning, evening, during daytime and in night.”
Kejriwal further said that the 21 AAP legislators appointed as Parliamentary Secretaries by the Delhi government were its “eyes, ears and hands”. “It is with their help that our government is functioning,” he said. “These Parliamentary Secretaries put in a lot of effort behind all the development work we do.”