Date:29/12/2007 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2007/12/29/stories/2007122961230300.htm

New Delhi

Charges of corruption in old age pension distribution

Staff Reporter

MLA alleges involvement of anganwadi workers

‘Tourism Department has passed on a piece of prime land in Gadaipur village to a trust’
Demand for increasing the number of sitting of the Delhi Assembly

NEW DELHI: All-India Congress Committee secretary and Delhi MLA Jai Kishen on Friday charged in the State Assembly that there was widespread corruption in distribution of widow and old age pension in Delhi.

Mr. Jai Kishen alleged that anganwadi workers involved in verification of people eligible for getting the pension were charging Rs.200 to 500 in bribe for giving a favourable report. In another sensational disclosure made in the House, BJP chief whip Sahib Singh Chauhan alleged that the Delhi Tourism Department had passed on a piece of prime land in Gadaipur village to a trust in which the wife of a senior Congress leader had a major stake. He said the Delhi Development Authority had earlier transferred the land to Delhi Tourism for some development work but the senior Congress leader, whose name had also cropped up in a petrol pump case, had taken over this land and now a permanent structure had also come up on it.

During the course of the day, BJP MLA Ramesh Bidhuri also demanded that the timings of the Assembly be changed and it should start from 11 a.m. instead of 2 p.m. keeping in view the needs of the media which finds the late hours inconvenient. The MLA also supported the demand for increasing the number of sitting of the Delhi Assembly and said all the legislators were being accused of shirking work due to the few sittings. Congress MLA Bheeshm Sharma also moved a resolution demanding that a separate Education Board of Delhi be constituted.