NEW DELHI: The intra-party struggle within the Delhi Congress intensified further on Friday with the senior Congress legislator from Ghonda, Bhisham Sharma, accusing Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit of joining hands with Reliance Energy chairman Anil Ambani and his Samajwadi Party friend Amar Singh to tarnish the image of the Congress party by overlooking discrepancies committed on the power front by the Ambani-owned power distribution company BSES inhere the Capital.

`Power crisis ignored'

In a letter to the party general secretary in charge of Delhi affairs, Ashok Gehlot, a copy of which has been marked to DPCC president Ram Babu Sharma, Mr. Bhisham Sharma has stated that there is a behind-the-scenes plan to ignore the power crisis in the city and give a clean chit to the private power distribution companies.

He said no action was being taken against the private power companies owned by the Reliance Group despite severe indictment by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) and the Public Accounts Committee of the Delhi Vidhan Sabha.

Mr. Sharma has further stated that there is also an attempt to hype the present situation of demolitions and ignore the basic issues of power and water troubling lakhs of residents of the Capital. The position on the power and water front is "very bad"; "not only are the consumers being slapped with inflated bills, fast running metres and long hours of power cuts, the Delhi Government has also been acting as the spokesman of the private companies, particularly BSES," he charged.

Intervention sought

Stating that the party was faced with a serious situation including possible erosion of its electoral prospects, Mr. Sharma, who had a few days ago demanded convening of a Congress Legislature Party meeting, urged Mr. Gehlot to intervene and save the Congress from being decimated in the civic polls scheduled for early 2007.

"Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit has lost interest in governance and is busy pursuing personal agendas by joining hands with forces that are anti-Congress and also with a leading English newspaper to tarnish the image of the party," he added.

Touching upon the issue of demolitions, Mr. Sharma said the ongoing demolitions have created panic among lakhs of residents, particularly the village folks of the Capital.

While the demolitions are being carried out at the behest of the Delhi High Court, he said, the Delhi Government as well as the MCD had failed to present the correct picture before the court.

Stating that a proper representation of the facts had not been made on the ground realities particularly in the rural Lal Dora areas, Mr Sharma said it was unfortunate that the Chief Minister instead of talking of resolving the issue had been provoking the situation with her uncalled for statements on the issue although she is also one of those who has been served a show-cause notice by the Corporation for unauthorised construction in her house at B-2 Nizamuddin East.

In view of the prevailing circumstances, Mr. Sharma wrote to Mr. Gehlot: "I therefore seek your intervention and appeal to you to save the party from any further disaster by taking up the matter with the party leadership."

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail