New Delhi, Dec 17: The Seventh Delhi Legislative Assembly held fewer sittings in its first year in 2020 than the previous assembly did in its first year in 2015, a new report by an NGO claimed on Friday. Mumbai-based Praja Foundation released its ‘Report on Delhi MLAs’ Deliberations in State Assembly Sessions’ during an online event.
It also issued a statement saying Praja analysed the “deliberations of Delhi’s MLAs, comparing their deliberations with manifesto promises made by their parties and looking at solutions to fill the gaps in the current problems”. “In 2020, the first year of the seventh assembly (current term), only eight assembly sittings were held as compared to 2015, the first year of the sixth assembly, when 26 sittings were held,” the report claimed.
A 69 per cent decline was seen in the number of assembly sittings from 2015 (first year of the sixth assembly) to 2020 (first year of the seventh assembly), the statement said. It also claimed that there has been a “three per cent decline” in MLAs’ attendance in assembly sittings from 2015 (90 per cent attendance) to 2020 (87 per cent attendance).
The NGO, known to release reports on lawmakers, councillors, etc, also alleged that “issues raised on health decreased by 83 per cent, from 66 in 2015 to only 11 in 2020”. “Praja has been tracking critical issues that affect quality of life such as education, health, housing and so on. It has been observed that during COVID-19 in 2020, overall only 55 issues were raised, in comparison to 963 issues raised in 2015,” said Milind Mhaske, director of Praja Foundation.
“This reflects poorly on the preparedness of cities like Delhi to tackle challenges such as COVID-19,” he added. The Constitution of India has vested legislative powers on MLAs to deliberate and formulate policies for the growing needs of citizens, including matters of public importance such as education, public health, local governments, irrigation, agriculture and more. These powers and functions directly influence the quality of life of citizens and are thus of extreme importance, the statement said.
“Towards that, Praja, over the years, has tracked the status of major services available in Delhi as well as traced deliberation trends by elected representatives in the Delhi assembly. we have analysed trends, identified service delivery gaps and shared suggestions to rectify them,” said Nitai Mehta, founder and managing trustee, Praja Foundation. The NGO also suggested that a mayor in the city should be empowered, and the mayoral term should be co-terminus with the term of the city government.
The city government should be the nodal agency for delivery of all the 18 functions of local importance, as mentioned in the 12th Schedule of the Constitution, it said.
Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor
Read all the Latest India News here
Comments
0 comment