Monday, May 30, 2005
Monday, May 30, 2005 |
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Advts: Classifieds | Employment | New Delhi
By Sujay Mehdudia
NEW DELHI: Although the people of Delhi continue to reel under a severe water and power crisis coupled with increasing incidence of corruption in the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party has failed to cash in on the opportunity to launch a broadside against the Delhi Government, political observers here feel. So sharp is the division in Delhi BJP that the party has not been successful in coming together on a single platform even on important issues concerning the people. Observers are of the view that the saffron party has for some strange reason failed to turn the heat on the Delhi Government despite a large number of public issues at hand including important ones like the non-functional 140 MGD Sonia Vihar water treatment plant. The Leader of the Opposition in the Delhi Assembly, Jagdish Mukhi, has only taken up the smart card issue in the Transport Department aggressively so far. He apparently feels that issues like water and power crisis should at best be handled by the party rather than the BJP legislature group. On the other hand, the former Union Minister, Vijay Goel, who had led the agitation on the issue of Value Added Tax (VAT), has also remained silent on issues affecting the citizens at large. The former Union Minister, Sahib Singh Verma, too seems to have done the disappearing act from the Capital's political scene. The other senior leader and zonal in-charge, Madan Lal Khurana, makes an occasional appearance on the issue of privatisation of Delhi Jal Board but seems to have little backing from the party. The South Delhi MP, Vijay Kumar Malhotra, is too busy with national level politics and has little time for Delhi. "The BJP is sharply divided into various camps. When the party should have hit the streets and taken the Government to task, they are busy fighting among themselves. There is hardly any coordination and this does not seem to bother even the Central leadership of the party," a senior leader remarked. Although the Delhi unit president, Harsh Vardhan, had launched a prolonged agitation on the issue of water and power but it made little impact as it was a low-key affair. The party has also failed to pin down the Delhi Government on the issue of corruption in various departments and also in the MCD. In fact, there is feeling within the party that those at the helm of affairs in the MCD are "deliberately" being soft on the Congress-ruled MCD and have failed to highlight the deteriorating administrative situation there. The situation is no different as far as the MLAs are concerned with the general talk being that BJP in the Delhi Assembly was a loyal Opposition not prepared to taken on the Delhi Government. "It is not that these issues are not known to us. It is just that the party is pulling in different directions and nobody seems to be coordinating with Dr. Vardhan. The young leaders in the party are not being encouraged to take up issues more aggressively," another leader stated.
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