NEW DELHI: AAP leader Atishi on Monday accused the city BJP government of failing to manage power supply, alleging outages have increased since the party took office last month.
In response, Delhi BJP President Virendra Sachdeva claimed that uninterrupted power supply is a fundamental duty of any government and accused the AAP of corruption in managing the power sector during its tenure.
Addressing a press conference here, Atishi said, “Before the AAP government came to power, long power cuts were normal in the national capital.”
She added, “Every household used to have inverters. But after Arvind Kejriwal became the chief minister of Delhi in February 2015, power cuts became history.”
The former Delhi chief minister cited data presented by the BJP-led central government in Rajya Sabha to say that Delhi received a round-the-clock power supply under the AAP government.
“The people of Delhi do not need data because they know that for the past 10 years, their inverters were unused, and they didn’t have to change batteries. But now, after the BJP formed the government in the city, power cuts are on the rise,” she said.
“How is it that in 10 years there were no outages, but within a month of BJP rule, power cuts are back? This means only one thing: the BJP doesn’t know how to run the government. They neither have the intention nor the capability to serve the people of Delhi,” Atishi said.
Sachdeva, in response, asserted that an uninterrupted power supply was not an “extraordinary achievement.”
“BJP-ruled cities like Mumbai, Pune, Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Bangalore, and many others already have uninterrupted electricity supply. Uttar Pradesh, which until 2017-18 was considered a state with poor electricity production and supply, today shines with good power supply. Providing 24-hour electricity is a government’s duty, not a favour to the public,” he said.
He also credited the foundation of Delhi’s stable electricity supply to the President’s Rule in 2014, when then Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley allocated funds for power infrastructure in Delhi.
“The central government allocated Rs 675 crore for new power plants and Rs 200 crore for strengthening power transformers and wires in Delhi,” he said.
“It is regrettable that the Arvind Kejriwal government has only indulged in corruption under the guise of electricity supply between 2015 and 2025,” he alleged
Sachdeva also alleged that the erstwhile AAP government “in collaboration with private companies, engaged in electricity subsidy and Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) scams?”