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AAP government missed almost all Metro board meetings before fare hike. The Delhi government representatives in the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) Board attended only one of the meetings out of the 15, held over the last two years, said Swaraj India on Tuesday, 10 September by citing DMRC’s annual reports, reported Hindustan Times.

The allegations came after Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal said that the government is ready to take over the Delhi Metro and provide efficient services.


Officials not attending meetings

The annual report of DMRC states how concerned the Arvind Kejriwal-led government is about the proper functioning about the metro railway. His officials were absent in almost all meetings of important committees of the board and he is talking about taking over Metro operations,” said Anupam, national spokesperson of Swaraj India, a party founded by ousted AAP founders Prashant Bhushan and Yogendra Yadav.

Documents shared by Swaraj India show that in the 2016-17, four meetings of the DMRC were held. The dates are, 24 May 2016, 22 July 2016, 16 September 2016 and 16 January 2016. Sanjeev Nandan Sahai, the member of the board in the capacity of Delhi Government’s principal secretary (finance) did not attend any of the meetings. He also missed the property development committee meetings held on 9 September 2016. He only attended the procurement meeting held on 21 may, 2017.


However, the party alleged that he attended one of the meetings of the audit committee in 2015-16. Similarly, Vikram Dev Dutt, the then transport secretary did not attend two meetings of the operations and maintenance committee in 2016-17 and Gitanjali Gupta Kundra, principal secretary (transport), gave only the operation and maintenance committee meeting a miss.

Anupam also accused Kejriwal of projecting that his government opposed to the hike. “If both AAP and the BJP are against the hike in fares of Delhi Metro, then who actually increased the fare?” he asked, “And why was there no opposition in May when both hikes were announced. It is a political drama,” he added.


Demanding a rollback of fee hike

Kejriwal on Sunday had offered to take over Delhi Metro and promised to make it more efficient. According to a report by Business Standard, Swaraj India on Tuesday demanded a roll-back of the rise in Delhi Metro fare hike and called it anti-people and beyond reason. It also said that the decision will have an adverse impact on women students and the poor who extensively use the metro for travelling within the city.

He also termed the decision to increase the fares as unfortunate and questioned the idea of increasing fare despite a hike a few months ago. AAP and Delhi Congress also launched campaigns to demand a rollback of the hiked metro fare.

The protests were held outside 69 metro stations across the city as a part of its Kiraya Satyagraha that blamed the centre for a fare hike. AAP’s student wing also protested outside Rajiv Chowk metro station in the morning with placards that asked the Centre, why Metro fare was hiked twice within one year.

Opposition BJP on Monday demanded the Delhi government to give a Rs 3,000 crore annual grant if it wanted a withdrawal of the proposed metro fare hike and abstained from the session that passed a resolution against the increase in the assembly. The leader of the opposition Vijender Gupta claimed that rules stipulate that the state government must bear the full operational losses of metro rail.

The Logical Indian Take

The Logical Indian community strongly dismisses the actions done by the senior officials. If they don’t actively shoulder the responsibilities which they are bestowed with, it would only lead to more mismanagement in the system. These senior officials must shoulder the responsibilities effectively so that carelessness on their part does not affect the daily lives of innocent citizens.

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Editor : Swarnami Mondal Mondal

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