Former Rajasthan CM Vasundhara Raje gives up facilities provided by government.

Source – freepressjournal.in

Kolkata: Former chief minister of Rajasthan Vasundhara Raje has surrendered the facilities of staff, vehicle and driver being provided by the government. She is yet to give up the bunglow that has been allotted to her.

At the same time former chief minister Jagannath Pahadia has been issued a notice regarding all the facilities that he is availing. This information was submitted before the Rajasthan High Court on Monday.

The matter is related to state governments providing lifetime facilities to former chief ministers. A petition had been filed by Milap Chand Dandiya through counsel Vimal Choudhary in May 2017. The RHC ruled in September 2019 that such facilities were unconstitutional.

“The state government did not comply with the September 9, 2019 order wherein the RHC had declared amendment to provide facilities to formers CMs as unconstitutional and illegal,” said Choudhary. The government did not implement the order and challenged it in Supreme Court.

Advocate general M S Singhvi told the court that the government was formulating a policy for providing accommodation to MLAs and sought time from the court for compliance.

He also told the court that the government was considering allotting the bunglow no 13 Civil Lines, where she is currently residing, to Raje in the capacity of a senior MLA.    

A division bench of RHC had struck down the Rajasthan Ministers’ Salaries (Amendment) Act, 2017 which provided facilities like staff, vehicle, driver and accommodation to former chief ministers for their lifetime.

The Supreme Court too had turned down the Special Leave Petition (SLP) of the state government on September 4, 2019. Raje had been facing opposition on the issue of holding on to the facilities from Nagaur MP Hanuman Beniwal, who has a personal axe to grind with Raje. He had been raising the issue alleging a nexus between Gehlot & Raje.

Beniwal had gone on to announce that he would launch an agitation after the panchayat elections, if the Gehlot government did not get Raje to surrender facilities.