The process of trifurcation of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi has moved a step forward with the Union Law Secretary and concerned Joint Secretary clearing the file and the Union Law Minister Salman Khurshid expected to go through it anytime soon, Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit said here on Wednesday.
Talking to The Hindu , Ms. Dikshit said the Union Law Minister was out of station and is expected to go through the file soon. “We expect the clearance from him in a couple of days and then the approval would be routed to us via the Union Home Ministry,” she said.
Of the view that these clearances could come as soon as Friday, Ms. Dikshit said in that case a special session of the Delhi Assembly would be called next week to pass the proposal for splitting the Corporation.
Earlier, on November 5, Ms. Dikshit had following a meeting with Union Home Minister P. Chidambaram exuded confidence that clearance from the Home Ministry for trifurcation of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi could come by November 8. However, while on November 6 the file did come to the Delhi Government and was signed by Ms. Dikshit, the wait for the final clearance got longer as it was forwarded to the Law Ministry.
But now the decks appear to have been cleared for the draft proposal. Since the Delhi Assembly had not been prorogued, the session can be convened at the earliest.
Ms. Dikshit had also confirmed that the MCD's split would be on the broad outlines decided earlier. The corporation is expected to be split into North, South and East with 104 wards in each of the first two and 64 wards in the East Corporation. As per the proposal, women would be provided 50 per cent reservation in these corporations.
Better governance
The Delhi Government believes that the new administrative and financial set up of the corporations would bring about better governance in the body that governs nearly 97 per cent of the geographical area of Delhi.
However, all the three Corporations would only take shape after the Municipal Corporation of Delhi elections in 2012. The draft proposal from the Centre would be placed before the Delhi Assembly in the form of a Bill and the House would be urged to allow the trifurcation of the Corporation.
Then the Parliament, which had constituted the Delhi Municipal Corporation Act, would be urged to repeal the aforesaid Act. As even this much procedure would take a lot of time, and by then the model code of conduct for the MCD elections would come into force, the new Delhi Municipal Corporation Act would be is only expected to be placed before the Delhi Assembly after the civic body elections.
It would be based on the policy paper being prepared by a committee constituted under retired IAS officer K. Dharmarajan. It would finalise among other things the boundaries of the Corporations, the revenue sharing model, how the personnel and cadre would be split, and various other details.
