This was no ordinary farewell party outside the Delhi Secretariat on Friday. This was the first occasion when hundreds of city administration employees along with Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, his deputy Manish Sisodia and his Cabinet colleague Sandeep Kumar said “good bye” to Chief Secretary Deepak Mohan Spolia, who attended his last day in office after serving different departments of the city administration for 36 years. Soon after Spolia went back to his office, he complained of breathlessness and chest pain following which he was immediately wheeled out to the GB Pant hospital.
A 1979-batch officer, Spolia who had also served as the Chief Secretary in former Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit’s Cabinet, broke into tears when he was requested to address his employees. “Thank You,” were the words he said in his chocked voice to the large gathering outside the Delhi Secretariat. “Whatever I had to say, I have said in my nothings and conveyed verbally to you all through my career.”
Terming Spolia as a “karmayogi”, Kejriwal said the term of such people never expires. “We are not going to leave you. We will be seeking your advise as and when need be.” The CM said he had got a huge mandate and it was his bounden duty to serve the people of Delhi. “My job is to keep you happy. Your job is to deliver.” A special shamiana was erected on the lawn of the Players Building on the occasion of farewell party. This was probably the first such kind of function of the Kejriwal Government.
Kejriwal said the employees knew nuts and bolts of the Government functioning. He requested them to personally drop in their suggestions to his office without fearing any bureaucratic action. “Send your suggestions to me in sealed cover. Only those who work commit errors. There will be no punishment for errors which have been committed with right intention.”
Speaking on the occasion, Sisodia said retirement for any employee was like his re-birth. But he said the employees feel the pain after they have to beg for their pension before their own colleagues with whom they had worked all through their lives. He said efforts should be made to ensure that pension of each employee gets delivered at his door-step without facing any problem.
The employees also assured the CM that they would help the new Government to make the city corruption-free in the next five years. “We promise you that we will give our best to make Delhi a world class city,” a leader of the employees union told the gathering. During his previous regime of 49 days, Kejriwal has shunted out Spolia from Chief Secretary post and brought to SK Srivastava, a 1979 batch officer. Spolia had played a major role in regularisation of unauthorised colonies by then Sheila Government and distribution of provisional regularisation certificate to people of unauthorised colonies.
