Seeking greater support from the Centre to cater to the needs of the people of the national capital, lieutenant-governor Najeeb Jung in his address on the first day of the Budget Session said his gove
Seeking greater support from the Centre to cater to the needs of the people of the national capital, lieutenant-governor Najeeb Jung in his address on the first day of the Budget Session said his government was awaiting approval of the Union government for enactment of three key proposed legislations in the education sector.
The L-G also said that the AAP government was committed to making the city corruption-free and a move towards this was the passage of the Lokpal Bill that has been sent to the Centre for approval.
These four proposed legislations are among dozen-odd bills passed by the Assembly without getting any prior approval from either the L-G or the Centre. Outside the Assembly, deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia said the AAP government was “sad” that the Centre was “sitting” on the bills passed by the Assembly, including the proposed legislation recommending hike in salaries of legislators, CrPC Amendment and Delhi School Education (Amendment). He said if the Centre does not give its nod to the city government’s bills at the earliest, there is “no benefit” of tabling new bills and sending them for approval.
“We have sent several bills, which are very important for Delhi, to the Centre including formation of a new university, amendments to the labour laws, journalists’ salary. If we continue to send bills from here to the Centre, there is no benefit. Lokpal Bill, which is very important, is also pending with the Centre. We are fighting for ACB (anti-corruption branch) and if Lokpal would been appointed today, corruption would been rooted out from the top to bottom,” Mr Sisodia said.
“We would have been able to increase seats in NSIT (Netaji Subhas Institute of Technology) after making the institute a university, but the bill pertaining to this is still pending with the Centre.”
In his 35-minute address in the Assembly, Mr Jung said the contribution of Delhiites to Central taxes was very significant as compared to other metropolitan cities and estimates suggest it was in excess of '1,30,000 crore. “However, Delhi’s share in Central taxes has remained stagnant since 2001-02 at '325 crore. Despite this, the continuous efforts of my government towards revenue augmentation have ensured adequate budgetary allocation for the welfare of the citizens.”
All through the L-G’s address, about 55-odd members were present in the House. Even environment minister Imran Hussain entered when Mr Jung had almost completed half of his address. The L-G enunciated the achievements of the AAP government in education, health and transport sectors and anti-corruption initiatives it had taken in its first year.
Mr Jung listed steps taken in the field of education, including the proposal to build 25 school buildings, sanctions granted for construction of 7,289 additional class rooms and 700 toilet blocks in existing schools. As a pilot project, he said, approval has been granted for upgrading 54 existing schools to modern schools with better infrastructure and quality education. He said the Delhi Jal Board has been ordered to provide new water connections in 205 schools.
With the aim to improve teacher-student ratio, Mr Jung said his government has approved the creation of 9,623 additional teaching posts.
Mohalla clinics figured in the list of steps taken by the government to bring about improvement in the health sector. In the transport sector, proposals to induct 1,000 new low-floor buses, fares through e-ticketing machines in all DTC buses from June were also mentioned by Mr Jung.
