Arvind Kejriwal was speaking in the Delhi assembly special session
New Delhi:
A furious Arvind Kejriwal today railed against Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena for allegedly stalling a Delhi teachers’ training visit to Finland, questioning whether he really has a say in these decisions.
“LG, who?” shouted Arvind Kejriwal, the Chief Minister of Delhi, in a fiery speech at the special assembly session called to focus on what the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) believes is relentless overreach by the Lieutenant Governor.
“Who is this LG? He is sitting on our heads. Who is he to decide how our children should be educated? These people have let our children stay uneducated. The LG doesn’t have powers to stop us. Nothing is permanent in life. We may be in power at the Centre tomorrow, with our LG. Our government will not harass people,” Kejriwal said.
“My teachers have not checked my homework the way this LG is checking my ‘homework’, complaining about spellings, handwriting…He is not my headmaster? I am an elected chief minister,” Mr Kejriwal quipped, drawing laughter in the AAP-dominated House.
Mr Kejriwal and his party have accused the Lieutenant Governor of scrapping the Delhi government plan to send primary school teachers to Finland to train. Mr Saxena has strongly denied it, insisting that all he wanted was a cost-benefit analysis.
“I said to him (the Lt Governor), who are you to ask for a cost-benefit analysis? The public elected me. He said the ‘President chose me’. I said, like the British chose viceroys? Viceroys used to say, ‘You bloody Indians, you don’t know how to govern’. Now you (Lt Governor) are saying ‘You bloody Delhiwalas, you don’t know how to govern’,” the Delhi Chief Minister fumed.
Mr Kejriwal alleged that the Lieutenant Governor bragged about the BJP winning 104 seats in the December Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) polls because him.
“He told me during a meeting that BJP won 104 seats in MCD polls because of him and that they wouldn’t have won even 20 seats without him,” said the AAP chief, also claiming that Mr Saxena said because of him the BJP would win all seven Lok Sabha seats in Delhi in the next general election.
The Lt Governor, he said, does not have the power to take decisions on his own. “The Supreme Court has clearly said that he cannot take a call on issues barring the police, land and public order,” Mr Kejriwal added.
The Delhi Chief Minister also showed a list of “children of BJP MPs, MLAs and ministers who have studied abroad”, and said everyone should have access to the best education.
The Lieutenant Governor yesterday denied blocking the teachers’ trip and said he wanted the government to consider training the teachers within the country. “Any statement on the contrary is deliberately misleading and mischievously motivated,” he said.
