Supreme Court verdict: Tug of war between Arvind Kejriwal and LG; 5 points

Three months after it took over, the AAP government, in May 2015, said that control of the Anti-Corruption Branch was handed over to then Lt Governor Najeeb Jung due to which it could not take strict action against corrupt officers. The Kejriwal government alleged that this was not so during the previous Sheila Dikshit-led administration, and added that the Centre had issued a notification to give control of the anti-graft body to the LG when Delhi was under President's rule in 2014.

In the last three-and-half years, the AAP-led Delhi government and the office of the Lieutenant Governor had tussles over several issues, bringing the administration to a virtual halt. Image source: PTI

In the bitter power tussle between Lieutenant Governor Anil Baijal and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, the Supreme Court verdict today handed a major victory to the AAP government by ruling that the LG has no independent power to take decisions and is bound by the elected government's advice. In the last three-and-half years, the AAP-led Delhi government and the office of the Lieutenant Governor had tussles over several issues, bringing the administration to a virtual halt. Here are five major flashpoints of the contention:

1. Three months after it took over, the AAP government, in May 2015, said that control of the Anti-Corruption Branch was handed over to then Lt Governor Najeeb Jung due to which it could not take strict action against corrupt officers. The Kejriwal government alleged that this was not so during the previous Sheila Dikshit-led administration, and added that the Centre had issued a notification to give control of the anti-graft body to the LG when Delhi was under President's rule in 2014.

2. In May 2015, the then LG, Najeeb Jung, appointed senior bureaucrat Shakuntala Gamlin as acting chief secretary of Delhi despite Chief Minister Kejriwal's strong objection. Irked over the move, the AAP government locked the office of the then service secretary Anindo Majumdar, who had issued Gamlin's appointment order following the LG's directives.

3-Since then, Kejriwal has frequently complained that he could not appoint even a "peon" or transfer an officer of his government with the Centre "snatching" services from the Delhi government and handing it to the LG. In December 2015, Delhi's bureaucrats had went on mass leave for a day against the AAP government's decision to suspend two special home secretaries.

4. In February 2018, Chief Secretary Anshu Prakash was called to Arvind Kejriwal's residence late at night and was allegedly assaulted by a group of AAP legislators. Following this, bureaucrats decided to boycott meetings with AAP ministers. The stalemate continued till the last week of June, and was broken after a nine-day sit in by Kejriwal, along with his deputy Manish Sisodia and Health Minister Satyender Jain.

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5. In May 2018, Kejriwal and his cabinet colleagues along with AAP legislators sat on 'dharna' near the office of LG Anil Baijal for over three hours, accusing him of stalling the AAP government's ambitious project to install 1.4 lakh CCTV cameras across the city at the "behest of the BJP". The L-G's office, however, stated that government files on decisions taken by it were cleared in accordance with rules.

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