New Delhi: Rajya Sabha on Monday passed the controversial Delhi Services Bill that allows centre to control the bureaucracy in Delhi shortly after the House rejected by voice vote opposition's motion to send the bill to a select committee. The bill got the support of 131 MPs in Rajya Sabha as compared to 102 members opposing it. The bill was passed by Lok Sabha last week.
Earlier speaking in Rajya Sabha, Home Minister Amit Shah said that the bill has been brought to safeguard the rights of the people and not to usurp the power of the AAP government.
Replying to a debate on the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Bill, 2023, Shah assured that the Upper House the objective of the bill was "only and only to provide efficient, corruption-free governance and popular government." He also assured the members that there is not even a single provision that changes the status of the system prevailing since the Congress regime.
Shah asserted that the bill is constitutionally valid and it does not violate the Supreme Court judgement from any angle. He said Delhi is different from other states because it houses Parliament, embassies, the Supreme Court and regularly many state heads from different countries visit the national capital. Therefore, Delhi was made a Union Territory.
"Delhi is a Union Territory with an assembly with limited powers," he said. In future, whoever fights elections in Delhi need to understand this character, Shah added. He said, "We have not brought the bill to usurp power. This is to stop the encroachment of the Delhi government on the Centre's powers."
Opposition slams centre
Members of the opposition alliance INDIA on Monday slammed the Centre in the Rajya Sabha over the bill, saying the proposed legislation was "unconstitutional" and against the spirit of federalism. The opposition bloc also got support from Telanagana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao's BRS, which saw the bill as a move to usurp powers of an elected government in Delhi, and asked the House to vote against it.
Initiating the debate, Congress leader and noted lawyer Abhishek Singhvi termed the Delhi services bill "unconstitutional" and "anti-democratic" and appealed to all opposition parties to oppose it with the warning that "someday this anti-federal knock will come" at their door too. He accused the government of bringing the bill out of "vendetta" and said it was against two verdicts of the Supreme Court Constitution bench.
His party colleague P Chidambaram lashed out at the Centre terming the bill "unconstitutional". The Congress leader further said he can understand the full support given by the BJP to the bill but "what I cannot understand is the half-hearted supported given by two of my learned friends representing the BJD and the YSRCP".
They too know that the bill is unconstitutional, Chidambaram said, adding, "I think the Law Ministry knows that this is unconstitutional." He likened the bill to a moth which burns when it approaches fire yet it approaches the same fire again and again. "This government tried it once. It failed. They tried it a second time, they failed and you are trying it a third time. I wish you what you will get is a spectacular failure when this bill is taken up," he said.
Leader of the AAP, which has a government in Delhi, Raghav Chadha said the Delhi services bill is a "political fraud" and "constitutional sin" aimed at taking away the powers of an elected government in the national capital. Chadha termed the bill as "the most anti-constitutional, illegal, undemocratic legislation ever presented" in the House. "I am stating today not representing two crore people of Delhi but 135 crore people of this country," he said.
Invoking the Mahabharata, he said his party seeks justice in the House. Participating in the debate, Vaiko of MDMK opposed the bill terming it as undemocratic and said it strikes at the root of democracy, federal spirit, secularism and social justice. "The bill which has been brought in the garb of administrative efficacy is many ways appears to erode democratic fabric, which is interesting to the Indian polity," he said adding it will render the chief minister's authority and is a deviation from the state list.
The ordinance was promulgated by the central government on May 19, a week after the Supreme Court handed over the control of services in Delhi excluding police, public order and land to the elected government, headed by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. The Delhi government had approached the Supreme Court for a stay on the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Ordinance, 2023, promulgated on May 19.
However, the Supreme Court last month refused to grant an interim stay on the Centre's ordinance. It referred the Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Ordinance, 2023, to a Constitution bench. (Agency inputs)
