Old, unfulfilled promises back in BJP poll agenda
MANIFESTO The party promised multilevel parking lots, CCTV cameras in classrooms and garbage collection and segregation in its manifesto for the April 23 municipal elections
Several promises that were made during the last polls but remained unfulfilled, featured in the BJP manifesto for April 23 municipal elections which was released on Sunday.
Some of these include multilevel parking lots, ready-mix concrete roads, CCTV cameras, computer education in schools, regularisation of illegal colonies and segregation of garbage.
Intriguingly, after a controversy over the mention of ‘Kabristan’ (burial ground) by Prime Minister Narendra Modi at a poll rally during the UP assembly elections in March, the word went missing from the manifesto. In its list of 2012 civic polls promises, the BJP had said that it will develop ‘shamshan aur kabristan’.
Senior BJP leader Satish Upadhyay, who was part of the manifesto drafting committee, said, “There is nothing intentional in it and the party cares for every section of society, irrespective of its faith.”
Some of the initiatives that the BJP-ruled municipal corporations are undertaking already, also find mention in the poll document. It includes online payment for various civic services, unique property identification card, dhalao-free Delhi, door-to-door gar- bage collection, restrooms for safai karamcharis and measures for cow protection.
In 2012, the BJP had promised to construct 100 multilevel parking lots. However, in the past five years, only three such sites -- at HauzKhas,KamlaNagar,Parade Ground and Model Town -- have come up. These, too, remain under-utilised as people prefer surface parking.
The Opposition said the BJP only made tall promises in its ‘sankalp patra’ but failed to provide a roadmap for its implementation.
Delhi Congress leader Sharmistha Mukherjee said, “Most of the promises are the same from the old manifesto. It seems they were short of ideas and for whatever new they had proposed, they have given no roadmap.”
The first point of the Sankalp Patra’ (charter of commitment) that talks of ‘good governance with transparency’ was featured similarly at the top of 2012 manifesto under transparent and accountable governance.
“It looks a work of copy paste of previous manifesto. The BJP has promised betterment of primary education standards to bring them at par with private schools, a promise that was also made in 2012,” said a former councillor.
Upadhyay, however, rebutted the charges and said that it should not be looked as a repetition “as development is an ongoing process”.
To counter the decreasing enrolment and high drop-out rate in the municipal schools, the BJP had listed concrete buildings and computer education in its 2012 manifesto too.
However, it failed to deliver the facilities in most of east and north Delhi schools.
The BJP rules all the three civic bodies in Delhi and is making an all-out bid to return to power against a decade-old antiincumbency and poor track record on managing sanitation in the national Capital.