‘Nobody should run away from Delhi, looking for cleaner air elsewhere,’ says Rekha Gupta

IT WAS DELHI Chief Minister Rekha Gupta’s first day at 2/8 Raj Niwas Marg in Civil Lines, a space dedicated to her interface with the city’s people. By the time she reached, sev­eral people had already lined up in the waiting hall, carrying flowers and sweets. Last-minute touches were still being given at the four-room bungalow, named Janseva Kendra (public service centre), where her interactions with the public are to be held. “We are just settling down. There is not even a bell yet to call anyone,” she laughs, looking at her table in her camp office.

Within days of taking charge as chief minister on February 20, Gupta began a “jan milan samaroh” at her existing residence at Shalimar Bagh, from where she is the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) debutante MLA. The exercise began in the basement of the house, but the number of visitors started increasing to 500-700 on some days. The pleas mostly involved issues that have been tormenting the city dwellers—power, school, water, roads, and sewage. This initiative, according to Gupta, sets her apart from her predecessors— Congress’ Shiela Dikshit and Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) Arvind Kejriwal. The doors of the Janseva Kendra, adjacent to her official residential bungalow, which is undergoing renovation, will remain open to the public. “I feel the official resi­dence I have got to serve the state should be a space for dialogue between the people and chief minister, where they can find me, meet me. In previous regimes, people never found the chief minister so close to them. For 15 years, Sheila Dikshit was the chief minister. You would have never heard of her meeting people, at her residence, hearing people’s pleas. It was the same with Kejriwal. In his 11-12 years, you would have never heard that he gave the opportunity for people to meet him at home, allowed anyone to cross his gate, or went up to people. AAP governments worked in a way that people’s involvement was the least,” says Gupta.

Two days prior to the Janseva Kendra’s opening, while in­augurating restored heritage structures like the Sheesh Mahal in Shalimar Bagh, Gupta took pot-shots at Kejriwal’s former residence, dubbed by her party as ‘Sheesh Mahal’, saying it was built for personal luxury at public expense. A CAG report found that ₹33 crore was spent on the renovation of Kejriwal’s official residence. AAP has now criticised Gupta’s official residence being renovated at a cost of ₹60 lakh calling it ‘Maya Mahal’ to get back at BJP. “Those who are making such allegations have spent over ₹60 lakh just on the curtains of their Sheesh Mahal,” says Gupta.

From inaugurating a mango festival to launching 50 health centres, she has been starting her day at 7AM, returning home past 9PM, says an aide. For her, the announcement by BJP, which returned to power in Delhi after 27 years, naming her as chief min­ister came with the realisation of the magnitude of responsibility she was being entrusted with. There were challenges, expecta­tions, tasks and promises to be fulfilled. Asked what she saw as her first challenge when she took charge, Gupta launched a tirade against previous governments. “AAP ne Dilli ko uljha kar rakha hai [AAP has left Delhi in knots].” The past six governments treated Delhi as an instrument of vote-bank politics. They were not con­cerned about what was right and what was wrong or who lived where—on drains, roadside, railway tracks. People were left to live without access to proper sewage systems, water lines, health­care, and educational support. They came to the city from various places in search of better jobs, opportunities, and living conditions, which they never found. Instead, slums kept growing. They lived a narakiya jeevan [a life like in hell]. They became vote banks of those governments because they were told that anybody else coming to power would evict them.”

She distinguishes earlier regimes and hers saying she has dedi­cated ₹700 crore in the budget for jhuggi cluster rehabilitation, to improve the lives of its inhabitants. Her government, however, has recently faced criticism over the court-ordered demolition of the Madrasi Camp in Jangpura, with former Chief Minister and Leader of Opposition in the Delhi Assembly Ati­shi posting on X that BJP had promised: “‘Jahan jhuggi wahan makan [where there is a slum, there will be a house]’, but as soon as it won the election, it bulldozed the Madrasi Camp.” With the demoli­tions displacing 370 families of Tamil origin, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin wrote to Gupta describing it as a humanitarian crisis and seek­ing rehabilitation for those affected. Gupta says the demolition of certain slums was carried out as per the court’s orders. “What is important to note is that in place of the demolished settlements, the government has provided alternative housing in the form of flats. We aim to inte­grate these residents into the mainstream and help them live with dignity, as citizens of Delhi. Of the 700 slum clusters in Delhi, only four have been removed and that too because they were encroach­ing on government land. Our government’s priority is to provide safe and dignified housing for the urban poor and protect the rights of slum dwellers.”

Gupta is walking a tightrope, trying to strike a balance be­tween development and humanitarianism, in a city which of­ten witnesses more migration into it than the number born in it. The influx from rural areas led to rising unauthorised colonies, an issue which has been at the core of Delhi’s politics. The first regularisation of such colonies was done over six decades ago, for around 100 residential pockets. Ever since, the number of un­authorised colonies multiplied, standing at nearly 1,800 today. “We have reached a situation where if you remove four illegal jhuggis, there is an uproar. There are thousands of people living for over 50 years in colonies which may have been set up during Congress regime and got revived during AAP’s time. Today, they are all part of Delhi and if you want to improve them, they should get facilities. You cannot leave people to lead a life of hell. It is the government’s duty to work for them. So after regularising these, the people of 1,799 colonies would lead a better life,” says Gupta.

Her government has continued with freebies offered by AAP, like free bus rides for women, financial aid to poor women and free electricity, steps which were dubbed by BJP and Congress as elec­tion gimmicks. The electricity subsidy under AAP had risen from ₹291 crore in 2014-15 to ₹3,250 crore in 2024-25. On the question of the feasibility of freebies and whether these can ever be with­drawn once people get accustomed to them since it could hurt any party politically, she says, “In drug addiction, it requires time to rehabilitate. A time will come when people themselves start saying they don’t need anything free. Today, those who wanted ₹200 water bill subsidised, want new pipelines; those who wanted free electricity, are asking for flyovers, schools, hos­pitals and other facilities. When you bring in the comparison and show people what they could have got but lost, they will gradually understand that today the need of the future gen­eration is development. At that time they will realise that they don’t want freebies, but development.”

She reels out figures revealing the grim side of the city—only 40 per cent of Delhiites get piped water while the rest depend on tankers, half of Delhi does not have proper sewer lines, there is not even one hospital bed per thousand people in the city, DTC faces a loss of ₹ 65,000 crore. A Comp­troller and Auditor General (CAG) report tabled by Gupta in the Assembly flagged deficiencies in public health infrastructure under the AAP government, including a shortage of doctors and medicines, as well as in mohalla clinics, once flaunted by AAP as an innovative model. “In Delhi, which is the country’s capi­tal, even today if you look at the health infrastructure, per 1,000 people, we have 0.42 hospital beds. Even in big hospitals, MRI, ultrasound CT scan machines, etc are not there. In mohalla clinics, there were no medicines, no doctors, no treatment. Portable cabins were kept near drains where animals moved around; there were no vaccinations, testing, or treatment. Doctors became thekedars (contractors) by being made to charge ₹40 per patient. Will the doctor then treat patients or count them?” asks Gupta. She blames the Kejriwal government for most of Delhi’s woes, saying it did not spend on development, but did vote-bank politics and made people believe theirs to be a model of development.

When BJP came to power, 50-year-old Gupta, one of the four women among the party’s 48 MLAs, became India’s 17th woman chief minister since Independence. She is also the only woman chief minister among the 15 states ruled by her party, with Parvesh Verma, who defeated Kejriwal, and was seen as one of the contenders for the post, as her depu­ty. BJP had promised to clean up the Yamuna, which flows through the city, in three years. “It is challeng­ing because earlier governments did not try planning it with vision. If there are 200 drains in Delhi, then all those, without any treatment, fall into the Yamuna, along with the sew­age. These drains should have been tapped. There should have been sew­age treatment plants on them. They should have had decentral­ised STPs. All unauthorised colonies should have had sewerage. All the 675 jhuggi bastis should have had sewage lines. We are trying to revive it with technological assistance and expert ad­vice…. I am not even saying three years. We have started taking steps, and we will find a way.”

Gupta headed a Cabinet meeting last month in which a “pol­lution control and emergency measures” project was approved, with ₹2,388 crore sanctioned over the next decade for dust pollution mitigation, including water sprinkler machines, road sweeping machines and anti-smog guns. The government plans to convert all public transport into electric mode, to reduce ve­hicular pollution, with 2,000 buses already joining the fleet. Asked what further steps she plans as chief minister of one of the world’s most polluted cities, Gupta says, “What you are asking is reflec­tive of what’s wrong with Delhi, whether it is Yamuna cleaning, garbage dump, cleanliness, pollution. Under earlier governments, people have been suffering from basic issues like waterlogging. Their hopes shrunk so much that they no longer demanded anything big. They just say let the sewer not over­flow, remove garbage from before my house, and drainage should not get blocked. Otherwise, on something like pollution which involves every breath people take, what has the earli­er government done? Nothing. Just ad­vertisements. And Delhi is paying for it with pollution levels being among the highest. There cannot be anything worse. This season, Delhi saw the low­est AQI of 81.” Her government, how­ever, has faced a backlash over the ban on fuel for 10-year-old diesel vehicles and 15-year-old petrol vehicles, forc­ing it to revoke the measure, taken to contain pollution. From getting 3,433 potholes fixed ahead of the monsoon to a Bill to bring transparency in the fee structure of private schools, Gupta is keeping a close eye on the city’s core infrastructure.

As her regime begins construction of 2,000 new smart classrooms, with plans to scale this up to 7,000, to be equipped with AI, smart boards, robotics, and other advanced digital tools, the Delhi government’s anti-corruption branch has summoned AAP leaders over allega­tions of graft worth ₹2,000 crore in con­struction of classrooms in government schools. “Those who have indulged in corruption will be punished by the court. My government is focused on transforming the infrastructure and quality of education in Delhi’s government schools to be on par with private institutions. Under the NCERT framework, 300 virtual labs are being made to make experiential learning in science and mathematics more accessible. Additionally, Dr APJ Abdul Kalam Language Labs are being set up in 100 schools, and 250 digital libraries are being launched across the city. The budget has announced the opening of 70 new ‘CM Shri’ schools, which will feature fully-equipped modern wings. In every sense, technologically, infrastructurally and ethically, my govern­ment is committed to making Delhi’s government schools not just equal to, but better than private schools.”

A student of Delhi University, where she began her political career becoming president of the students’ union, she dreams of a Delhi that no one wants to leave. ‘“Dilli mein Dilli walon ka dil lage [Delhi should captivate Delhiites].’ Nobody should leave, looking for cleaner air somewhere, nobody should run to another state to develop an industry. I want to make a beautiful, better Delhi which is the right of all Delhiites.”