Will LG Allow Rekha Gupta To Function?

'Will the LG be ready to rule with a light hand, having been vested with powers that amount to using a hammer to kill a fly?' asks Aditi Phadnis.

"Mazaa aa gaya" chortled a functionary of the Bharatiya Janata Party in Delhi after the assembly election results, which installed the party in power in the city (the party lost power in 1998).

"But the path of the new chief minister is not going to be easy."

He was referring to new power equations that the verdict will throw up for the administration of Delhi.

Over the past few years, the lieutenant governor of Delhi has been empowered in a variety of ways.

In 2023, an ordinance that was later passed by Parliament -- the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Act -- established the National Capital Civil Services Authority, which consists of the chief minister, chief secretary of Delhi, and principal home secretary of Delhi.

The Authority can recommend to the LG transfers and postings of officials and disciplinary matters.

This means the elected government cannot appoint, transfer, or post bureaucrats.

On August 5 last year the Supreme Court upheld the LG's authority to nominate 10 persons with special knowledge of municipal administration to the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) was a statutory duty attached to his office and he was not bound by the aid and advice of the council of ministers.

The specific issue was the appointment of 10 aldermen to the MCD, to which the then Aam Aadmi Party government objected on grounds that only public order, police, and land were within the Centre's remit: On everything else the LG (and the Centre) was bound by the aid and advice of the council of ministers.

Not so, said the Supreme Court, relying on the letter of the law governing Centre-Delhi government relations, as well as earlier judgments that sought to strike a balance between the elected regime and the appointed administrator.

Then a few weeks later, President Droupadi Murmu delegated powers to the LG to constitute any authority, board, commission or statutory body under any law enacted by Parliament applicable to the Delhi government.

The AAP didn't even try to contest this: Because the Centre is empowered under Article 239 of the Constitution, read with Section 45D of the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi Act, 1991, to take the decision.

Under AAP, the BJP needed to control the Capital and rule with a heavy hand.

But under a BJP government and chief minister, will these powers still be necessary?

It is a moot question. Even more pertinent, will the LG be ready to rule with a light hand, having been vested with powers that amount to using a hammer to kill a fly?

In Delhi-Centre relations, there is another political aspect that needs to be watched.

The ministry of home affairs is the authority that oversees most aspects of Delhi's administration.

The BJP is likely to get a new national president in the next few weeks.

A lot will depend on the equation between the president of the BJP and Union Home Minister Amit Shah.

We must never forget that statehood, such as it is, for Delhi was a struggle that the BJP helmed, led by Madan Lal Khurana.

Most in the BJP were happy when the AAP government's powers were emasculated, on the grounds that the party just could not be trusted with Delhi.

But in many ways, Delhi has regressed from the BJP's original struggle for statehood.

A party president will understand and sympathise with this.

But will he be a person with the political stature and authority to tell the home ministry and the LG that an elected Delhi government is now perfectly capable of taking decisions in the city's interests?

The MCD is held by the AAP. The Centre has two options: It can dissolve the MCD and hold fresh polls, or it can run the body through commissioners.

This further centralises powers and makes you wonder why elections to the MCD are even held.

The BJP is mindful that on the ground the AAP still exists.

And so does the Congress. In 14 seats of the Delhi assembly, the Congress got more votes than AAP's margin of defeat.

On at least one seat, the Majlis e Ittahadul Muslimeen contributed to a three-way Opposition split that led to the victory of the BJP (Mohan Singh Bisht from Mustafabad).

Granted these are arithmetical rather than political equations. But it will take no time at all for the AAP, which is more comfortable in a role as an Opposition than a ruling party anyway, to ask the BJP uncomfortable questions about its powerlessness vis a vis the Centre.

While it is unlikely the BJP will make any real administrative changes in the way Delhi is now governed, it might have to tweak the optics of how it runs the city.

Otherwise, all Madan Lal Khurana's sacrifices will have been for nothing.

Feature Presentation: Ashish Narsale/Rediff.com