By Sidharth Mishra

The 15 years that Sheila Dikshit was prima donna of Delhi politics, this former reporter had the privileged job of covering her for 14 years for The Pioneer, first as beat reporter and then for over a decade as the head of the city reporting unit. Those were the years of the BJP grounding its feet firmly in national politics and The Pioneer was its only credible sympathizer. Under the situation, it was quite a challenge to cover the most prominent Congress leader in the national Capital.

However, contrary to the expectations, Sheila Dikshit had a great traction with the newspaper and took her criticism in right spirit. It also went to the credit of the newspaper’s editorial policy, especially its editor Chandan Mitra, that he never approved of negativism in reporting and encouraged development related reports which more often than not ended up giving credit to Sheila Dikshit.

By Sidharth Mishra

Delhi has no full stops and it is not at all a static city – this was something which acted as the governing principle for Sheila Dikshit, the Congress leader who ruled the city for three consecutive terms as its Chief Minister from December 1998 to December 2013 and passed away on Saturday fighting a battle to revive the fortunes of her party as the president of its Delhi unit.

 The first reaction of people on hearing of her demise was, the city is going to miss her. She closely identified with Delhi and carried out her work with an extra-ordinary passion, never ever distracted with any ambition to look beyond the precincts of the city government.

Development of Delhi for her were defined by two parameters – make Delhi into a World Class city but also get it the tag of the Heritage City. 

By Sidharth Mishra

Last fortnight at a function organized by the Delhi Jal Board to lay foundation stone of nation’s biggest sewage treatment plant, changing political environment of the city became so visible.  Union Minister for Jal Shakti, Gajendra Singh Shekhawatshared dais with Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, where the latter took everybody by surprise by profusely thanking the Centre for the support.

It did not stop there. When Shekhawat pointed out that all hoardings on way to the venue gave credit only to the Delhi Government whereas the project was being funded by the Centre, Kejriwal accepted the error and said credit should be given wherever it was due.

By Sidharth Mishra

The day Supreme Court appointed Environment Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority -- sought apex court’s intervention to save the national Capital from choking, city’s transport minister Kailash Gehlot said that the cabinet note for the free bus ride for women would be ready soon.

The aforementioned fact clearly indicates that the transport policy of Delhi Government was not directed towards strengthening the existing system but instead draining it for electoral gains. The EPCA in its report to the apex court mentioned that “The Delhi government has not added new buses into its fleet for the past four years. Delhi has 17 buses per lakh people compared to 107 buses per lakh people in Beijing. But what is also alarming is that these buses are ageing — all of DTC’s current 3,600 on-road buses are over eight years-old and it will be necessary to phase them out in the next few years.”

Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal despite having failed to add even a single bus to city’s dilapidated fleet, has gone on to announce that the free rides would not be limited for women but would be extended to the senior citizens and students too. The question is that for a free ride there also has to be a bus but given the state of affairs, the public transport system in the national Capital for now was moving towards a collapse.

By Sidharth Mishra

The first Economic Survey brought out by Narendra Modi 2.0 government laid down the current dispensation's ambitious target to make India a $5 trillion economy by 2024-25. The Budget, which followed the survey, elaborates on the roadmap, allaying the rising curiosity in the Indian psyche over the government's reasonableness. Budget 2019 puts India on the developmental course to achieve target of a $3 trillion economy in the current year itself. In the past five years, the Indian economy has jumped from $1.87 trillion back in 2014 to $2.7 trillion in 2019.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman presented her maiden budget speech with a grand Indian vision laden with developmental aspirations and an investment-driven economy. The confidence for such a vision comes from the fact that its people have made it possible to add $1 trillion to the economy between 2014-2019 though it took 55 years for the Indian economy to reach $1 trillion.

By Sidharth Mishra

Recently there was an incident where the Delhi Metro operations had to be halted on the Magenta Line because of the fire in the slums below the metro lines. Services between Jasola Vihar and Kalindi Kunj stations had to be paused due to the smoke caused by the fire. This incident has a great symbolic value. As slums and gutters continue be integral part of the national Capital, Delhi Metro rises above all running a world class operation.

This has been possible because, when it was planned, the main stake holders, the Centre and the Delhi Government rose above petty political considerations to give the city and the country a world class transport system. A group of ministers in the Atal Bihari Vajpayee government, which was headed by Lal Krishna Advani, worked in close cooperation with the then Congress government in Delhi led by Sheila Dikshit to usher in the service.  

By Sidharth Mishra

In the last session of the 16th Lok Sabha, the unprecedented happened. The Opposition managed to stall even debate of the Motion of Thanks to the President’s Address. The Opposition all through the past five years ensured ‘dysfunctional’ parliament, courtesy their majority in Rajya Sabha.

The first session of the 17th Lok Sabha begins this week. The start would be marked by the customary oath taking followed by the election of the Speaker. The actual business would only begin after the President addresses joint session of both the Houses.

Though the treasury benches have returned even more stronger in the Lok Sabha, a somewhat of a status quo remains in Rajya Sabha with the ruling benches no expected to get numbers larger than the Opposition till the second half of 2020. The question is, would the Opposition continue to play the politics of spoil sport or engage in sporty debates to put the government on the mat.

By Sidharth Mishra

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has never had it so good in the national Capital. Though it is not the first time that it has won all the seven Lok Sabha seats, it did it earlier in 1999 and again in 2014, however this time around it’s their vote share in the city has risen to an unprecedented 56 %.

The last time BJP got votes somewhere closer to the 50% mark was during 1993 Vidhan Sabha polls. Then under the leadership of a redoubtable Madanlal Khurana and at the peak of Ramjanambhoomi movement, it had polled around 47% votes.