October 19, 2022—Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee president Ch. Anil Kumar said that the final report of the Delimitation Committee for the delimitation of 250 MCD wards, notified by the Union Home Ministry, was a mere formality as it did not incorporate any of the 168 corrections/suggestions/objections filed by the Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee with the Delimitation Committee, and the silence of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on this anti-Dalit, anti-Minorities report was baffling. He said that the objections/suggestions filed by the Delhi Congress with Delimitation Committee chairman Shri Anil Dev were not carried out in the final report to betray the people of Delhi, and Congress will approach the Delhi High Court for justice, for upholding the democratic norms and to protect the interest of Dalits and Minorities.
Ch. Anil Kumar said that the final report of the delimitation of the MCD wards notified by the Union Home Minister seems to have been drafted in the RSS headquarters at Nagpur, to bail out the BJP in Delhi, which was sure to face ouster for its 15 years of corruption-ridden misrule in the MCDs had the elections been held on due date in April. He said that the three MCDs were merged into one on flimsy grounds to postpone the elections in a bid to favour the BJP. He said that the final report not only did not adhere to the norms laid down for the delimitation of the wards, like restricting the population in each ward to 65,000 with a 10 percent Plus-Minus variation, but also divided the Dalit and Minority-dominated wards into adjacent wards to diminish their population strength so that BJP and AAP could gain unfair advantage in the MCD elections. He said that it was not surprising that Kejriwal has not spoken out about the irregularities in the draft and final reports, as he was party to BJP’s political gimmicks. Others present at the press conference were Chairman of the Delhi Congress Delimitation Committee and ex-MLA Shri Harishankar Gupta, Chairman of the DPCC Communications Department Shri Anil Bhardwaj, ex-MLAs Shri Mateen Ahmed, Shri Vijay Singh Lochav, Shri Amrish Gautam, Shri Veer Singh Dhingan and spokesperson Dr Naresh Kumar.
Shri Harishankar Gupta said that the Delimitation Committee ignored the suggestions/objections filed by Delhi Congress on the draft report, as the final report was finalized at the direction of the BJP. He said that Delhi Congress strongly objects to the final report, and will approach the court for redressal of its complaints. He said that the final report of the Delimitation Committee was done only to favour BJP and AAP. He said that the final report was a betrayal on the people of Delhi, whose right to elect a candidate of their choice has been undermined.
