Leader of the House, South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC), Kamaljeet Sehrawat criticised Delhi Government over nonpayment of funds to the Municipal Corporations of the national Capital stating that Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal doesn’t even give time to meet MCD representatives.
“AAP Government claims to make Delhi into Paris or London but how will they do it if the Municipal Corporations don’t even have funds to clean the streets and roads of Delhi? They haven’t fulfilled their promise of regularising unauthorised colonies. Lack of planning on the part of the Delhi Government is the root cause of all the chaos in the city. The solution is the regularizing of those colonies so that they can get all the rights. But Kejriwal Government doesn’t even want to talk to us”, said the Leader of the House adding that comparing the budgets of Delhi Government and Municipal Corporations is not a fair exercise.
“He is running around meeting the Prime Minister and the Finance Minister for money and the Central Government is willing to listen to him. But when we ask for a meeting, we don’t get any. He cannot even give us any of his time, how can we expect funds”, she said while speaking to the media in the presence of SDMC Mayor Sunita Kangra and Chairman, Standing Committee Bhupender Gupta.
Adding to this, Mayor of SDMC Sunita Kangra said that SDMC has written four letters, numerous reminders and nearly two dozen phone calls to the CMO but we haven’t got any meeting with the Chief Minister.
“AAP Government claims to make Delhi into Paris or London but how will they do it if the Municipal Corporations don’t even have funds to clean the streets and roads of Delhi? They haven’t fulfilled their promise of regularizing unauthorized colonies. Lack of planning on the part of the Delhi Government is the root cause of all the chaos in the city. The solution is the regularizing of those colonies so that they can get all the rights. But Kejriwal Government doesn’t even want to talk to us”, said the Leader of the House adding that comparing the budgets of Delhi Government and Municipal Corporations is not a fair exercise.
“People often compare the budget of the corporations and the Delhi Government. This is not a fair comparison. How can one compare the budget of Delhi Government which is around Rs 60 thousand crore with the budget of SDMC which is just 3000 crore”, she said
The Mayor also said that SDMC is planning a Bharat Darshan Park in Punjabi Bagh area on the lines of its earlier venture Waste to Wonder Park. This park will have the replicas of all major tourist destinations of India with street food from all the states. “We are in talks with several companies to raise funds for this venture and we are hopeful of a positive outcome of the talks in two or three months”, she said.
She also clarified that no house tax has been increased by the SDMC and the rates of tax are same as last year. “It has been decided to extend last date of payment of property tax from 30th June to 31st July, hence all offices of property tax which were earlier instructed to remain open on 30th June, 2019 will now remain closed because of extension of last date”, she said while adding that the decision has been taken keeping in view the reported glitches in the website of the SDMC.