Delhi MLAs pass resolution to hike their salary from Rs 12,000 to Rs 30,000 p.m.

Bill sent to President of India for final assent

New Delhi, July 4 (Delhi Crown): The members of legislative assembly (MLAs) in Delhi on Monday unanimously passed a resolution to raise their salary from Rs 12,000 to Rs 30,000 per month.

If all the allowances are added to the salary amount, an MLA in Delhi presently gets Rs 54,000 per month. This amount would now be raised to Rs 90,000 per month, including Rs 30,000 Salary, Rs 18,000 Constituency Allowance, Rs 10,000 Travelling Allowance, Rs 10,000 for telephones, Rs 15,000 Secretarial Allowance, etc.

The resolution thus passed will now be sent to President of India for the final stamp.

Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA Saurabh Bhardwaj appealed to the Opposition MLAs to “take it up” with their party’s central leadership to ensure that the Bill gets President of India’s assent at the earliest.

This is the first time when Delhi MLAs’ salary was raised in the past 11 years. Prior to that Delhi MLAs’ salaries were raised on five different occasions, since 1993 when Delhi Assembly came into being.

Supporting the Bill, Leader of Opposition (LoP) Ramvir Singh Bidhuri, of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), promised to Bhardwaj that he will make use of his position in getting the Bill cleared from the office of President of India.

“If need be, I will take a delegation of my party’s MLAs to President of India’s Secretariat to get it cleared at the earliest,” quipped Bidhuri.

Most of the MLAs who spoke on the occasion rued the fact that the salary of MLAs in Delhi was the lowest among all the states. They cited the salaries of MLAs in Telangana who get a monthly salary of Rs 250,000.

The Kejriwal government had for the first time proposed to raise the MLAs’ salary from Rs 12,000 to Rs 50,000 in the year 2015. However, it was rejected by the Central Government.

The MLAs were of the view that their status was equivalent to Delhi’s Chief Secretary, but there was a huge difference between the two in terms of salaries.

They also sought to increase the number of Data Entry Operators made available to an MLA from two to four, and also raise their salary from present Rs 15,000 per month.