Leaders of all three corporations staged a protest at Vidhan Sabha on Wednesday against cut in funds allocated to the civic bodies in the 2019-20 budget of the Delhi Government presented on Tuesday by Delhi Finance Minister Manish Sisodia.

Hitting out at Delhi government, municipal councilors alleged that the reduction in fund allocation was done intentionally to paralyze the functioning of the corporation.

South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC) Mayor Narender Chawla said “As per recommendations of the 5th Delhi Finance Corporation (DFC) the amount earmarked for SDMC is only Rs.437 cr against Rs 1081 cr during 2018-19. The net loss to SDMC is Rs 644 cr due to discriminate budgetary allocation,”

He further stated that Delhi government has been frequently creating hurdles in the functioning of the SDMC by reducing grants.

Leader of House in SDMC Kamaljeet Sehrawat alleged that Delhi government has selectively adopted recommendations of the 5th DFC only because it wanted to ensure failure of the SDMC. She said that out of 171 major recommendations only 71 have been accepted while 41 rejected and 77 recommendations merged with each other. “The new formula for distribution of tax share out of the existing 12.5 to 10.5 per cent tax share is going to be detrimental to the needs of civic body,” Mayor said.

Mayor of North Delhi Adesh Gupta also demanded the Delhi government to release the outstanding dues of the corporation. “The Delhi government has fixed the amount of Rs. 6380 crores for three corporations in the budget of 2019-20, which is less than Rs. 510 crores against the previous financial year, he said, adding that its share is decreasing every year.

Gupta said that the Delhi Government did not issue the due arrears of the corporation despite the court’s order.