By Sidharth Mishra

This move would give more autonomy to the unified corporation vis-à-vis the state government, to the extent of bypassing it thus adding to the multiplicity of authority in the national Capital. The trifurcation of the MCD in 2012 on the initiative of then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit was a move to bring the local governance under the city government. This would now stand neutralized. 

By Sidharth Mishra

Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s address in Delhi Assembly on the motion of thanks to the Lieutenant Governor’s address has gone viral, thanks to the IT cell of the BJP and its cohorts. Kejriwal is being lambasted for not making a recent Bollywood release Kashmir Files tax free for viewing in the cinema halls of Delhi.

Courtesy the very enterprising IT cell’s initiative, and alittle realizing the damage they were doing, a large section of the social media citizens of the national Capital got a full eight-minute video to watch, where Kejriwal roasted his political rivals and pointed to them how clueless, rudderless and adrift from reality was the leadership of Delhi unit of the BJP.

The reference to Kashmir Files came when Kejriwal referred to the ruckus created by the opposition benches during the Lt Governor’s address a day earlier. Pointing to the placards carried by the small team of eight BJP MLAs during their protest inside the House, Kejriwal said that some demanded shutting down of the liquor shops and others making Kashmir Files tax free.

He was not very far from truth in claiming that the local leadership of the BJP has no understanding of the issues in the city, and like true puppets wait for their strings to be pulled by party’s central leadership to act. It fails political understanding that how could making the viewing of Kashmir Files tax free be an issue in capital’s politics.

The BJP’s IT Cell is responsible for creating a larger national narrative for the party in consonance with its ideology but at the state-level the challenge of agenda-setting has to be taken up by the local units. BJP has the example of Uttar Pradesh, where Yogi Adityanath-led local party apparatus dovetailed the local agenda with the national narrative and not the converse, as being done in Delhi to peddle national narrative as part of the local political agenda. This is sure sort formula for the local BJP unit to face rout in the municipal polls, as and when they are held.

Who understands this better than Arvind Kejriwal? On the day when his government should have been cornered for poor health condition of the citizens, Delhi just topped the tuberculosis list, the opposition benches remained blissfully unaware about it, forget raising the issue in the house.

According to the data from the Central Tuberculosis Division under Union Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, TB cases in Delhi have increased by 11,421 or 13% in the last one year. A total of 87,062 cases were recorded from 22 March, 2020, to 22 March, 2021, while in the next one year (22 March, 2021 to 22 March, 2022), the number increased to 98,483. One is still to come across a statement from the Delhi BJP on the matter of tuberculosis with its president Adesh Gupta keeping himself busy with Kashmir Files.

The Aam Aadmi Party is engaging BJP in Delhi on the issues of identity and the latter is willfully walking into the political minefield. AAP has engaged BJP into a race of competitive nationalism as it suits its political strategy for the municipal corporation polls.

The fact remains that the unification of MCD has been necessitated as the Delhi government failed to adequately fund the municipal body. There is now a provision of central funding for the municipal bodies under the new bill presented in parliament. But who would take this message to the people if the BJP cadres are busy vending cause of Kashmir and remain oblivious to problems of the national Capital.

(First published in The Morning Standard) 

By Sidharth Mishra

The postponing of the MCD polls inadvertently has given a breather to the Congress high command. If the state elections commission would have decided to go ahead with the polls in April, which were postponed at the last moment, the grand old party would have been staring at another rout.

This would have meant another defeat in Delhi, where the Congress first lost turf to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), since the winter of 2013. This would have further bruised the beleaguered party high command. With AAP having moved the Supreme Court to hold polls on time, the Damocles’ sword continues to hang, lest the apex court ask the poll body to hold elections.

In the dissident group of 23 Congress leaders, popularly known as G-23, there are four names from Delhi alone – Kapil Sibal, Sandeep Dikshit, Arvinder Singh Lovely and Yoganand Shastri. Veteran Shastri has since joined the Sharad Pawar-led Nationalist Congress Party (NCP).

By Sidharth Mishra

Though Delhi did not go for assembly polls, it, however, cannot remain unaffected by the results in Punjab, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Manipur and Goa. The ruling party of Delhi, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), has registered victory in Punjab with a thumping majority and is all set to form the government.

AAP’s presence in Punjab has been there since the party’s inception in 2013, as it had surprised many by winning couple of Lok Sabha seats in 2014. During the 2017 Vidhan Sabha polls its performance confirmed that 2014 results were not a flash in the pan. It ended up second pushing the Akali Dal to the third position.

However, the point to be noted that is that despite much media hype, and declaration of the Chief Ministerial candidate much in advance, the party failed to open its account in Uttarakhand and did not rise to the expectations in Goa either. This is surprising as these two states were expected to have better degree of acceptance for AAP’s small state governance model than Punjab.

By Sidharth Mishra

While commuting in Delhi one has felt increasingly miserable in the past few years; thankfully now research reports have also appeared that indicate that poor road conditions in the national Capital has led to sluggish traffic conditions.

According to these reports traffic in Delhi moves at half the speed of what the roads are designed for. The major arterial roads in Delhi are designed to achieve a driving speed of 50-70 km per hour and the regulated speed, as decided by the traffic police, is 40-55 km per hour.

However, survey by agencies like the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) among others, have observed that the average speed on these roads now is 26-27 kilometres per hour. This means that a commuter in Delhi takes almost double the time to travel to the destination wasting precious fuel and also man hours.

By Sidharth Mishra

Medieval poet and Bhakti movement saint Ravidass must not have ever thought that seven hundred years after he departed from this planet, his name would go ‘viral’. The elections in India are capable of bringing back anything from the deep dungeons of history to the surface making it part of political discourse, as happened in the case of Sant Ravidass last week.

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal tweeted on Tuesday night last week that in Delhi, government offices would remain shut as a public holiday has been declared to celebrate Ravidass Jayanti. This sent Delhi into quiet turmoil specially the managements of schools and colleges.

By Sidharth Mishra

In 1993, after a long hiatus, the city had in place a popular government. BJP leader Madanlal Khurana became Chief Minister, the first to occupy the chair after the assembly was dissolved in 1956.

The 1990s was also the time when mosquito driven ailment Dengue started to make its formidable presence in the city. Khurana’s cabinet had a young medical professional, Dr Harshvardhan, as Health Minister. In the midst of one of those early Dengue waves, Delhi government had issued a notification asking the schools to replace skirts with trousers for the girl students to cover their legs.

This led to a hue and cry with rights groups pointing out that it was a move towards the saffronisation of education. The government was at pains to point out that Aedes aegypti, the dengue and other related fever causing virus attacked during morning hours and in the lower portion of the body, thus the precaution advisory. But there weren’t many takers for it.

By Sidharth Mishra

On the first working day of this year that is January 3, 2022, the city was brought to a grinding halt by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) protesting against the new excise policy of Delhi Government. Those on roads that much cursed city’s opposition for having taken up an ‘irrelevant’ issue.

For Delhi Government, which has made spending beyond its income, a liberal excise policy help to keep the cash box clinging. With the Municipal Corporation polls round the corner, BJP has drawn a strategy to up the ante on the liquor issue and oppose Delhi Government’s liberal excise policy.

The new excise policy has a social context and a social concern too. Would it see a rerun of 1990s when the liquor propelled studs ran amuck in the city? There were several instances like the infamous BMW case, Jessical Lal case, which all had a late night liquor party as part of the script.