The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has approved a proposal of the Delhi Government for increasing the salary of MLAs. Now, the basic salary of Delhi MLAs will increase from Rs 12,000 to Rs 30,000 per month and their total salary, including allowances, will increase to Rs 90,000 from the current Rs 54,000.
After receiving suggestions from the Centre, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Government will bring a legislation to increase the salary of MLAs. The proposal was sent by the Delhi Government in 2015 and was not approved by the Centre then. According to AAP MLA Saurabh Bhardwaj, in 2015 the Kejriwal Government had proposed to the MHA that the salary and allowances of Delhi MLAs should be at par with those from other States.
However, the MHA "restricted the proposal" of the Delhi Government and capped the salary to Rs 30,000. But it permitted an increase in all allowances which includes the Constituency Allowance from Rs 18,000 to Rs 25,000; Conveyance Allowance from Rs 6,000 to 10,000; Telephone Allowance from Rs 8,000 to Rs 10,000 and Secretariat Allowance from Rs 10,000 to Rs 15,000.
Addressing a press conference, Bhardwaj said that the revised Bill now needs to be placed in the Delhi Vidhan Sabha, passed and notified. Only after that would the total salary of Delhi legislators increase to Rs 90,000.
He further said that other States are currently paying 1.5 to 2 times higher salaries and allowances. “The restriction imposed by the Centre has ensured that Delhi's MLAs are among the lowest-earning MLAs in the country,” he said.
Sharing details of salary of MLAs from other States, Bhardwaj said that the MLAs of Telangana earn Rs 2,50,000; those in Maharashtra earn Rs 2,32,000; those from Uttar Pradesh get Rs 1,87,000; Rs 1,60,000 in J&K; Rs 1,60,000 in Uttarakhand; Rs 1,30,000 in Andhra Pradesh; Rs 1,25,000 in Himachal Pradesh; Rs 1,25,000 in Rajasthan; Rs 1,17,000 in Goa; Rs 1,15,000 in Haryana and Rs 1,14,000 in Punjab. Commenting on this drastic difference, he added, "Despite the salary of Delhi MLAs being Rs 12,000 many websites show it as Rs 2.10 lakh which is completely false.”
“The Bill has been stuck with the Centre for the last seven years, from 2015 to 2022. So for the last seven years, the salary of the MLAs of the Delhi Government has been Rs 12,000. Besides this amount, they receive a constituency allowance, conveyance allowance, secretariat allowance and telephone allowance. The secretariat allowance includes the rent of the offices of the legislator. The telephone allowance includes the bill of the various telephones of the legislators.
“The conveyance allowance is for the legislators to be able to move around in their constituency for their work. The total, after including all of these allowances, would add up to Rs 54,000 and this is what the legislators would receive.
If you Google the salary of the legislators for other States of the country and as well as those for Delhi, you will be shocked to see that the search engine states it to be Rs 2,10,000. This is the information that you will get even on Wikipedia, which is absolutely false,” he said.
“So, it is clear that the salary of a legislator in Delhi is among the lowest in the country. We wanted to highlight this to the national media, so that there is no misreporting on this matter,’” Bhardwaj said.