AAP, BJP engage in political blame game over termination of contractual staff at DCW

New Delhi: The Aam Aadmi Party and the BJP on Tuesday engaged in a political blame game over the termination of all contractual employees at the Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) just days before Diwali. 

The Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) in an order earlier on Monday discontinued the services of all its contractual staff with immediate effect.

Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convener and former Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal assured the affected workers that his party would fight to get their jobs reinstated.

"I assure my sisters who have been fired from DCW that I will get them their jobs back, no matter what it takes," he said in a post on X.

Senior AAP leader and former Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia criticised the BJP for dismissing the contractual staff at the DCW, calling it a direct contradiction of the saffron party’s promises of job creation in its manifestos.

“The BJP has done wrong by snatching the jobs of people just before Diwali. Their manifestos talk about giving employment, but they are taking away the jobs of people who have been working on contracts for the last 30 years. How will these people celebrate Diwali now?” he asked.

“The BJP is a party for snatching jobs and their talk about giving employment is a sham,” Sisodia said, asserting his party stands with the affected workers and will take necessary steps to support them. 

The AAP claimed that the dismissals were "paradoxical," highlighting that the BJP had previously promised to regularise contractual employees upon coming to power in Delhi, but the decision to terminate the DCW staff contradicted these assurances. 

AAP leader Reena Gupta also lashed out at the BJP. “BJP’s anti-women face has been exposed,” she said.

The BJP countered the allegations, putting the blame on the AAP government for the plight of the terminated workers. 

Delhi BJP president Virendra Sachdeva said, “The Kejriwal government’s anarchy is responsible for the plight of the terminated contractual female employees.”

He accused the AAP leaders of neglecting the contractual workers during their long period of unpaid salaries and emphasised that the terminations were linked to irregularities in the hiring process.

BJP leader and West Delhi MP Kamaljeet Sehrawat said the people of Delhi would not forgive Kejriwal for "playing with their lives". 

She claimed that the DCW had been inactive for over six months without a chairperson, suggesting that the AAP government failed to reconstitute the commission.

The DCW's decision to discontinue the services of all its contractual employees was based on an earlier order from the Women and Child Development (WCD) Department dated April 29, which had approval from the lieutenant governor. 

According to official sources, the decision to terminate the employees was due to complaints about irregularities in the hiring process.  A total of 223 contractual posts were created in the DCW, but 52 staff were engaged with the commission when the WCD had discontinued their service in April this year, they said. 

A committee appointed by the then LG had submitted a report in June 2017 recommending that the appointment of contractual staff engaged without having sanctioned posts and without following the due procedure cannot be allowed to continue, sources added.