By Ashish Joshi
In 1991, the Parliament gave special privileges to Delhi when it introduced article 239AA which created two centres of power and governance for the capitol. People of Delhi elect their own legislature and government to make laws under some entries of the state list of the Seventh Schedule of the constitution while the powers with respect to public order, land and police remain with the centre. Time and again governments who have come to power in Delhi have lamented this setup arguing that it cripples their functioning as an effective government and often demanded statehood for Delhi.
Statehood for Delhi a far-fetched dream
The Kejriwal led Delhi government filed a series of petitions against a High court verdict that holds the Lt. Governor of Delhi as the final authority in the matters of governance on the grounds that it cripples their strategy and pointlessly slows down their governance. Hence, the Supreme Court appointed a five-judge constitution bench headed by Chief Justice Dipak Misra to hear out the petitions and obtain more clarity on the division of power in Delhi.
The Additional Solicitor General of India, Maninder Singh on the Centre’s behalf told the bench on Tuesday that Delhi can never be considered a state as the constitution never envisaged such a possibility for Delhi. “If you have to treat a Union Territory as a State, then the Constitution must provide for it or say so. Unless there is a specific mention, you can’t read State into it.” He ridiculed the demands of the Delhi government by saying,“The demand is that I am not a State but treat me as a State” and argued that any further special treatment of Delhi will only lead to a chaos.
Focus on better governance, not statehood
The ASG further defended the High Court Verdict which held Lt. General as the final authority for governance in Delhi by referring to a 1987 committee which was set up by the Centre to examine the demand of statehood for Delhi. The committee rejected the demands saying that the powers of democratically elected councillors can be vested in the Union Territory of Delhi. Further, he also pointed out that only 650 files have reached the desk of Lt. General over a period of last three years and only 3 out of these 650 fell in Centre’s domain and thus went to the President.
Shekhar Naphade, a senior counsel and representative of the Delhi government, said that the government is happy with the lieutenant governor exercising all his discretionary powers, all they want is that he has to follow the advice of the elected government on certain matters. He further argued that the Delhi government is not demanding any form of statehood, instead, their entire focus is to provide a better and effective governance to the people of Delhi.
Featured Image Source: Wikimedia
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