CM holds meeting with MCD commissioners

After a series of protests led by the three MCDs demanding release of funds, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday reviewed the status of funds released to the Corporations under Plan and Non-Plan heads. The meeting was attended by the Chief Minister and senior officers of the Delhi government including Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia and all the three Commissioners of the MCDs.

The Delhi government released the position of funds as against Revised Estimates and said that the entire amount of Rs 892.92 crore earmarked under Proposed Revised Estimate for North Delhi Municipal Corporation under Non-Plan has been released by the government. In case of East MCD, entire amount of Rs 465.53 crore has been released by the government. South MCD has been given an amount of Rs 668 crore i.e. 80 per cent of the earmarked Rs 830.41 crore. The remaining amount will be released by January 19 following which funds under Non-Plan earmarked under Proposed Revised Estimate will be released to all the three Municipal Corporations.

It was informed in the meeting that the Municipal Reform Fund (MRF) can only be released in accordance with law and the Corporations have failed to meet the requirement of surplus budget, which is essential for seeking this fund, but the Corporations are showing a deficit budget. SDMC on Thursday released an advertisement urging the Delhi government to implement the Fourth Finance Commission so that the Corporation could come out of the financial mess.

Meanwhile, the party on Friday hit back at the Corporations for publishing advertisements, appealing the Delhi government to release funds to them, saying the money spent on it should be recovered from the Mayors of the three civic bodies. “On one hand the BJP-run Municipal Corporations of Delhi (MCD) say that they don’t have money to give salaries and on the other they are spending money on advertisements. The Mayors should be held responsible for this and the money should be recovered from them,” AAP’s Delhi unit convenor Dilip Pandey said.

There were advertisement in a section of media in which Mayors of the three MCDs appealed Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and Delhi Finance Minister Manish Sisodia to release around Rs 6,000 crore as per the recommendation of the 4th Finance Commission. Targeting the BJP, AAP’s Delhi unit treasurer Raghav Chadha said it should ask the Centre to give money as the MCDs were yet to receive hundreds of crores under the ‘Swachch Bharat Abhiyan’ initiative. “The Delhi Development Authority has to pay thousands of crores to MCDs, the Centre has to pay several hundred crores to the MCDs under the ‘Swachch Bharat Abhiyan’ initiative. But still they are targeting the BJP. The Centre is not sharing any kind of taxes with the civic bodies. “In fact, the Delhi government has released bigger amount, which was not even released during the Centre’s rule (President’s rule),” Chadha said.

Meanwhile, SDMC Mayor Subhash Arya said: “I am not inclined to reply their question on money spent on the advertisement. What is wrong in the advertisements? When the AAP government can level allegations against MCDs and Central government through its advertisements by spending public money, why can’t we give advertisements.”