New Delhi:
Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and his deputy Manish Sisodia have asked the Centre for assistance in acquiring land for construction of new educational institutions in Delhi. They met union urban development minister Venkiah Naidu today.
"Arvind Kejriwal and I today met Naidu ji and asked him to give land to the Delhi government for construction of new schools and colleges," Sisodia told reporters after the meeting.
In its manifesto, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) had promised to construct 20 colleges and 500 schools in different parts of the city. The party claims that no new college has been built in Delhi over the past 15 years.
"How will we be able to do other works if we spend Rs 8-10 crores for purchasing land? As such the Delhi government has asked the Union Minister to give it land," said Mr Sisodia.
AAP government has been demanding full statehood from the centre that would give them, powers over the land pool and Delhi Police for better governance.
The chief minister and Lieutenant Governor (LG) Najeeb Jung have been locked in a tussle over control of the state's affairs for the past few weeks, especially those related to transfer of senior officials. AAP has blamed the centre for using LG's office as proxy to run the affairs bypassing an elected government. Centre maintains that LG is the final authority on transfer of officials in the state.
After facing criticism for adopting confrontationist attitude with the centre, the AAP government seems to be focusing on fulfilling their electoral promises. AAP had won 67 out of 70 assembly seats in the state during the elections in February this year.