Cops had little to do with improved law, order: LG

NEW DELHI, January 6: Delhi Lieutenant Governor Vijai Kapoor today said that crimes relating to money had increased in the Capital. The...

NEW DELHI, January 6: Delhi Lieutenant Governor Vijai Kapoor today said that crimes relating to money had increased in the Capital. “The police should emphasise on substance building rather than image building,” he pointed out while addressing his annual press conference. The Lt Governor also said that as 93 per cent of all crimes were committed by first-timers, the police should not deal with them in a “ham-handed manner” and seek more “social cooperation in dealing with youth showing such propensity”.

Adopting a stern line on law and order, Kapoor insisted that the situation had improved in 1998 but added that it had very little to do with the Delhi Police. “Group violence has been checked. Moreover, Delhi has had only stray incidents of communal violence which did not escalate into major riots,” he said. Admitting that the crime graph had risen steadily in the past year, the Lt Governor said, “There has been an increase in offences that have money as the motive, like frauds in non-banking financial companies and stock exchanges.” But, according to Kapoor, crime against women had fallen by 7 per cent. “This is a good sign,” he added.

In 1998, there were 123 dowry-related cases as against 148 in 1997, 423 rapes as compared to 544 and 725 cases of “other acts of cruelty” as against 855.

The Lt Governor hoped that with new courts coming up in Shahadra all cases would reach their logical end. On the prevailing power crisis, he said, “The power situation this summer will depend on how well the Delhi Vidyut Board (DVB) can work on augmentation and maintenance, failing which there is bound to be a shortfall.” A review meeting to take stock of the progress on a white paper on the DVB is scheduled for tomorrow.

Kapoor admitted that with the “unacceptably high” transmission and distribution (T&D) losses and corruption “no board can work and will soon collapse”.

Warning that stern action would be taken against power theft, the LG said a CBI official of the rank of inspector-general was working with the DVB to check corruption in the department. He said that the government also planned to regularise electricity connections to unauthorised colonies.

On the shortage of drinking water, Kapoor added: “The Delhi chief minister has had two meetings with his Haryana counterpart on the supply of raw water to treatment plants in Delhi. I am sure that he will appreciate our needs.” Terming the National Capital Region Plan “not good enough”, he said that it had not been implemented in its right spirit.

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“We have quantified the land left in Delhi for housing and found out that it is possible to build only 18,000 more houses. The task of building them will begin this year”.

These, he said, would be multi-storeyed structures which would come up in Dwaraka Sector 18, Okhla and Trikhand near Badarpur. The LG, who is also the chairman of Delhi Development Authority (DDA), added, “Vasant Kunj is yet to stabilise as a colony. So the DDA has volunteered to arrange for the street-lighting which is not its job”.

He said that besides the 17 fly-overs which are under construction currently in the city the Government would announce 13 more this year. “For the first time, the DDA urban development fund will be used for building roads,” Kapoor said. Work on a bridge connecting Noida to Maharani Bagh has already begun.

He expressed happiness over local bodies Capital like the Municipal Corporation of Delhi, New Delhi Municipal Council and Cantonment Board “harmonising” their functions with the Delhi government despite their “political differences”.On the next Master Plan for Delhi, the Lt Governor said that “societal dimensions” of the plan were important. “The vision of a new Delhi must emanate from the people,” he said.