Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s pet odd-even scheme came for a scathing attack in Parliament yesterday with members alleging it would “generate corruption” and was aimed at “insulting” MPs as they sought exemption from the scheme to attend Parliament. Raising the issue during Zero Hour in Lok Sabha, Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav contended that the scheme would not help CNG companies and companies manufacturing buses and cars and would hardly reduce pollution. He said Kejriwal had introduced the scheme to gain “cheap popularity.”
In the Rajya Sabha, Naresh Agrawal from (SP) made a strong pitch for exempting MPs from the scheme as has been done for some other sections, a view that found resonance among most of parties as well as Deputy Chairman of the House PJ Kurien.
Agrawal said, “The Delhi government did not exempt the MPs deliberately in order to insult them even as many others were exempted. Ever since the odd-even scheme has been launched, we are facing problems.”
Leader of Opposition Ghulam Nabi Azad and Congress Deputy Leader Anand Sharma backed the views saying the scheme was coming in the way of discharging their duties. Kurien also supported the sentiments and asked why did the Parliamentary Affairs Minister not take up the matter with the Delhi government. Wondering how the scheme could be implemented when Parliament was in session, Congress leader Anand Sharma urged the Centre to take a call and insisted. His party colleague Rajiv Shukla said, “the only solution is that MP-labelled cars should be exempted.”
