In a serious political development, President Pranab Mukherjee has reportedly refused to give consent to “the Delhi Members of legislative Assembly (Removal of Disqualification) (Amendment) Bill 2015” that sought to pre-empt possible disqualification of 21 MlAs under office of profit provisions for being appointed as Parliamentary Secretaries.
In other words, 21 Parliamentary Secretaries appointed by the AAP Government in 2015 might face disqualification by the Election Commission. Kejriwal, who called an emergency meeting of the party soon after the news broke, said the Government did not give a penny, bungalows or cars to any of these MlAs.
“Modi ji says make them all sit at home. No one will do any work,” he tweeted.
In a second tweet, he said, “Ek MlA to bijli pe laga rakha tha, ek ko pani pe, ek ko hospital pe, ek ko school pe. Modi ji kahte hai na kam karuga, na karne dunga.”
In a third tweet, he said, “One MlA was spending his own money while visiting hospitals. What did he do wrongIJ Modiji has now made him sit at home.”
AAP media co-ordinator Deepak Bajpai also played down the development, saying it will have no bearing on the future of the MlAs as they are governed by a different set of rules.
“This law didn’t exist. It was brought in case of future appointments. Our present Parliamentary Secretaries are under a distinct set of laws, thus it doesn’t stop their membership. It does not bother us at all as it has no bearing,” he said.
Top sources told The Pioneer that the President refused to give consent to Bill after consulting the law Ministry as it had been introduced without prior mandatory legal and constitutional sanction of the Union Government.
The Bill, passed by the Delhi Assembly last year, had proposed amendment to the Delhi Members of legislative Assembly (Removal of Disqualification) (Amendment) Bill 1997 to declare that the office of the Parliamentary Secretary to the Chief Minister and Minister of the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi should not be disqualified and should be deemed never to have been disqualified for being chosen as or for being a member of the legislative Assembly of the National Capital Territory of Delhi.
In 2015, the AAP Government had appointed 21 parliamentary secretaries to six Council of Ministers. In his order, then Principal Secretary (General Administration Department) Anindo Majumdar had said, “The Parliamentary Secretaries will not be eligible for any remuneration or any perks of any kind from the Government. However, they may use Government transport for official purposes only and office space in the Ministers space would be provided to them to facilitate their work.”
The contentious issue of the appointment of Parliamentary Secretaries has immense political significance with both the Congress and the BJP hoping that if these AAP legislators are disqualified, the two parties would get chance to contest these seats to make their presence felt in Delhi politics. Of the 70 seats in Delhi Assembly, the AAP had won 67 and the BJP was able to retain just three constituencies.
After President of India’s decision, the AAP MlAs who could come under the EC scanner are Sharad Kumar, Sanjeev Jha, Sukhvir Singh, Rajesh Gupta, Som Dutt, Alka lamba, Shiv Charan Goel, Jarnail Singh of Tilak Nagar, Jarail Singh of Rajhouri Garden, Rajesh Rishi, Adarsh Shastri, Kailash Gahlot, Vijender Garg, Praveen Kumar, Madan lal, Naresh Yadav, Avtar Singh, Manoj Kumar, Nitin Tyagi, Anil Kumar Bajpai and Sarita Singh.