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Congress confident of good showing in Assembly polls

NEW DELHI: The Congress in Delhi is feeling rejuvenated after the Manmohan Singh Government won the trust vote in Parliament and there is a growing feeling within the party that it would be able to put up a good performance in the Assembly elections due later this year.

The new-found confidence in the Congress primarily stems from two reasons. One, the manner in which the party conducted itself in Parliament has conveyed the impression that it is not only good at floor management and keeping its flock together, but it now also has a new young breed of politicians, led by scion of the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty Rahul Gandhi, who know the art of politics and can revive the party’s fortunes on the national stage. The second and the most important reason why the party leaders are now more confident of a good showing is that having freed itself of all shackles, the Congress can now usher in the reforms it had long been waiting to introduce.

“We now also have the nuclear deal to go to the people with. Congress has shown that it is a patriotic party and as for the Bharatiya Janata Party it stands completely exposed on the issue,” said Delhi Development Minister Raj Kumar Chauhan.

As for the issue of price rise and inflation, which the BJP is hoping to cash in on, he said these were not going to be major issues in Delhi as the poor are cushioned from price rise due to access to the public distribution system. Besides, the Government had also subsidised cooking gas to minimise the impact of rising gas prices.

Mr. Chauhan said the Congress would be going to the people on the development plank. The issue of regularising unauthorised colonies would also be used by the party for winning over the masses, particularly the over 40 lakh people living in these colonies.

In fact, the Delhi Government has now invited Congress president Sonia Gandhi to distribute the first 11 or so provisional certificates to these unauthorised colonies at a function that has been planned on former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi’s birth anniversary on August 20. While the plan to invite her had been drawn over a week ago, it was put on hold as there was uncertainty about the outcome of the trust vote in Parliament.

In the meantime, the Government would be organising a special camp at Delhi Secretariat from the first week of August to enable submission of relevant documents for issuing provisional regularisation certificates to 1,639 unauthorised colonies across the Capital. It had earlier planned this camp at Pragati Maidan but was unable to book the venue.

At the camp, representatives of unauthorised colonies would be able to submit complete layout plans, maps and compact discs, among other things, pertaining to their colonies so that the colonies could be issued provisional regularisation certif- icates. These certificates wo-uld be issued to the 1,639 una-uthorised colonies that came up before March 31, 2002. These colonies also include 149 unauthorised colonies which came up as extension to “village aabadi” and have not been notified as “lal dora” extension and 84 left-out portions of already regularised unauthorised colonies.

While the provisional certificates do not provide any protection to these colonies from sealing or demolition, as the regularisation matter is still pending with the Supreme Court, the Congress leaders insist that it openly shows the intent of the Government to provide all rights and facilities to the residents of these colonies.

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