The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Government led by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal completed two years in office on Valentine’s Day. listing the achievements of the AAP Government, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said the national Capital’s administration has been brought back on track. “The system that the AAP inherited after the Congress’ 15-year rule was corruption-ridden but it has been cleaned now,” he said.
In its two years in power, the AAP-led Government has set up 110 Mohalla clinics, created 8,000 new classrooms, opened free canteens and taken a holistic approach to education across the city, amid frequent confrontations with the Centre.
The AAP Government released a working report, highlighting the schemes and projects taken up and achieved in the last two years, on Tuesday.
While releasing the book, Manish Sisodia read out a quote of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal saying that “honesty” in governance is the party’s focus.“We did not come in Government to provide just a few more roads or schemes than the previous Government, but we came to change the way of governance. This is why the people chose us with a historic mandate. It cannot be just called governance but a dream,” Sisodia said.
Sisodia who is also the Education Minister said, “We are not the first elected Government but our legacy remains to be a corruption-free Government. We never worked for and with any vested interests.”
He took a jibe at the Centre saying that “no matter how many committees are set up against us, we would always come out cleaner and stronger.”
Sisodia spoke against the Delhi Police for arresting AAP MlAs in a range of controversies, calling them “arbitrary.”
Sisodia said the main priority of the Government as well as the citizens should be “education and health” and then things like infrastructure.
“While all priorities are important but when we decide for our family’s welfare, we think about educating our children not building the walls... We have been able to fix and do more than we said we would. We have filled the gap and done away with this disconnect,” he added.
In their second year in power, the AAP Government focused on the reading ability of students. The Government found out that 3.5 lakh students in Class VI-VIII could not read and launched a campaign to ensure they gained basic reading abilities. The Minister spoke about Reading Mela, parent teacher meeting and evaluations stressing that the AAP Government delivered more than it promised.
He expressed the wish that India would fight elections on the poll plank of education.
While speaking to The Pioneer, Health Minister Satyendra Jain said, “Creating awareness among the people of Delhi by first educating them and then making them self-reliant in order to create a safe and healthy lifestyle is the main aim of the AAP.”
The Government has come up with novel ideas to make Delhi pollution-free. The odd-even vehicle scheme was one of the main popular decisions of the Government’s two-year term so far.
However, the pollution levels continue to remain one of the main challenges of the Government in a highly polluted and congested city.
On the occasion, Jain said at least 5,000 families were shifted from jhuggis to achieve the target to make Delhi
“Slum-free”.
“We have also installed many street lights to do away with dark spots. DUSIB made the best night shelters as it is our duty to provide shelters to those who don’t have one.”
He claimed that Delhi is the only city which has surplus power and the Government made sure to provide 24 hours power supply “without cuts.”
One of the starry projects on AAPs list is the elevated cycle tracks across the city. Jain said, “It would be the most attractive cycle tracks where people would visit to just see it, once approved.”
“We will come out with 1,000 Mohalla clinics, besides launching 100 canteens where health cards and health insurance policy for Delhi would be issued. It will be introduced soon,” Jain added.
While enumerating the achievements of the AAP Government, Water and Tourism Minister Kapil Mishra hailed the people of Delhi for giving AAP a sweeping mandate.
He said the Government had set a target for providing potable water across the city.
Kapil Mishra said, “Despite providing 20,000 litres of water for free, the Delhi Jal Board has earned additional revenue of `178 crore in the last two years.”
Presenting the highlights of the working report which was released by the AAP Ministers, the Chief Secretary MM Kutty said, “large number of health clinics have been opened making healthcare easy for people and CAT ambulances have also been launched to give easy access to the patients across Delhi.”
The Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) at current prices increased to `5,58,745 crore in 2015-16 from `4,94,460 crore in 2014-15, registering a growth of 13 per cent.
In real terms at constant prices, Delhi’s economy grew at the rate of 8.34 per cent during 2015-16 in comparison to 7.6 per cent growth at national level GDP at current prices has increased from 3.93 per cent in 2011-12 to 4.12 per cent in 2015-16, while the share of Delhi in the total population of the country is just 1.43 per cent.
The Per Capita Income in Delhi at current prices in 2015-16 is `2,80,142 as per advance estimates of Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP), which is about three times higher than the per capita income of `93,293 at national level. Delhi’s economy has a predominant service sector with a share of 82.3 per cent of GSDP followed by 15.5 per cent industry and 2.2 per cent agriculture sectors, the Chief Secretary added.
“Cautious efforts are being made to provide easy traffic and push for completing Phase-III, while gave a nod to Phase-IV of Delhi Metro to make Delhi defecation free thousands of toilets have been constructed,” added Kutty.
Environment Minister Imran Hussain said it was due to the efforts of their Government that the city had less pollution levels. He said Odd Even scheme was so “hit that there was a demand to keep it throughout the year which was not possible.”
Taking a dig at the Centre, labour Minister Gopal Rai said even after getting chocked from different ends, the Government did inclusive job in the city.
He said while the Centre claims “labour reforms”, it is “only the Delhi Government which attained labour reforms on ground”.
He took a jibe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi saying that he talked about “minimum Government, maximum Governance but demonetisation has raised questions across the country. We are not Congress who could take on BJP but AAP has the power of people with them to take on BJP.”