No end to Delhi power crisis even as AAP, BJP, Cong play blame game

With rising mercury levels, the political climate in Delhi is also heating up. A power crisis in the time of an oppressive heat wave in the capital seems to have turned into an opportunity for political parties to score brownie points. While the Congress and AAP have trained their guns on the BJP government at the centre, accusing it of dragging its feet, the BJP is using every opportunity it gets to blame the crisis on the 15-year Congress rule in Delhi. [caption id=“attachment_1564453” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational image. Reuters[/caption] After a day of high drama at the Delhi secretariat, where senior state Congress leaders gheraoed chief secretary Sanjay Srivastav for over two hours demanding speedy resolution of the power crisis, Tuesday morning saw AAP party workers land up at Union Health Minister and Delhi BJP president Harsh Vardan’s house seeking answers from the centre on the deteriorating power situation. AAP, which had campaigned in Delhi on the issue of power and had announced a 50 percent power subsidy and ordered a CAG audit of power distribution companies during its 49-day rule, looks set to revive its bijli campaign in Delhi. Pitching the power crisis as a “public versus corporate struggle”, former law minister and AAP MLA Somnath Bharti said, “The BJP and the Congress have always been pro-corporate. They never think of the welfare of people. When power companies had threatened us that they would cut power, we had clearly stated that the day they do it, we will cancel their licences. Today, the BJP is ruling in Centre as well as in Delhi, if they have the guts let them do it. The war today is between corporates and the public.” Rejecting the charge that AAP was politicising the issue with an eye on Delhi elections (if and when they should be announced), Bharti said, “We are not trying to get any political mileage. We are only trying to bring out the suffering being faced by Delhiites in this power crisis. We gave the government enough time to fix this. Now it is more than 20 days. We need answers.” Faced with growing public anger over the power crisis, the newly sworn-in BJP government has put the blame squarely on the 15-year rule of Delhi by the Congress, accusing it of not investing in power infrastructure. “The power crisis is not a creation of one day or two months. Overnight, the capacities cannot be increased. The Congress government is solely responsible for the current power crisis. The day they privatised the distribution of power, the crisis started. First they committed scams in collaboration with distribution companies. Then they continued the scams one after another. They were in league with these companies,” said senior BJP leader and MLA from Janakpuri Jagdish Mukhi. Bringing up the issue of the additional damage caused to transmission towers by the storm that hit Delhi on 30 May, Mukhi said, “It will take more than a month for damaged towers to be erected. In the meantime, we have arranged for temporary measures. If there is a gap between demand and supply of power, it is the Sheila Dikshit government that is responsible and the nautanki government that came for 49 days and did nothing except fool the public.” Edged out by AAP, which in the last two elections has appropriated large chunks of its traditional voters in Delhi, the Congress, desperate to remain politically relevant, has taken to dramatic forms of protest to attack the Centre for failing to tackle the crisis. Delhi state Congress president Arvinder Singh Lovely told reporters on Monday that if the “power and water situation did not improve fast, the Lieutenant-Governor of Delhi and the Union Power Minister will be gheraoed.” Accusing the BJP of politicising the crisis by pointing fingers at the Dikshit government, Mukesh Sharma, spokesperson for the Delhi Congress said, “Why is the BJP not sitting in dharna when all of Delhi is suffering from power cuts. Are these the “ache din” the BJP was talking about? Every summer, Delhi gets extra power allocation. Why is the central government not doing that? The government is telling lies by blaming the crisis on transmission problems. This is a conspiracy to increase the electricity rates in Delhi.”