New Delhi, April 6 The Delhi High Court ruled on Monday that the assurance given by then Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal in March 2020 regarding payment of rent on behalf of poor tenants during the Covid-induced lockdown could not be enforced, as it was not followed up with any official action.
The ruling by a bench of Justices C Hari Shankar and O P Shukla came in response to an appeal by the Delhi government against a single judge's 2021 decision, which held that the Chief Minister's promise to citizens was legally enforceable.
"A mere statement made by the Chief Minister would not be legally enforceable, even if the citizens to whom it was made believed it to be so."
"Since the assurance to pay the rent, using State funds, was not translated into any written document, such as an Office Memorandum, Notification, Circular, or any other legally binding instrument, it cannot be enforced simply because it was made in a statement during a press conference," the bench said, as it rejected a request by several daily wage earners to implement the assurance.
The division bench observed that Kejriwal's announcement that rent on behalf of poor tenants would be paid by the State, made during a press conference on March 29, 2020, was not supported by any legal provision and was "apparently made in the heat of the moment".
The court stated that although the Delhi government ought to have translated the assurance into a written document, this never happened, and even the order issued by the Delhi Disaster Management Authority (DDMA) on the same day as the press conference did not envisage payment of rent by the State.
"There is nothing before us to indicate that, before he extended this assurance, the Chief Minister, or the executive authorities below him, had assessed the financial and other implications of the assurance, or the impact it would have on the State exchequer. Given the position the country found itself in at that time, we indeed doubt whether such an exercise was even possible, let alone within the span of a single day," the court said.
"We are therefore of the clear view that the assurance that the State would pay the rent of the migrants, for the period during which the lockdown remained in force, having not been followed up with any official documentation to that effect, cannot be enforced by a writ of mandamus," the court opined.
In the appeal, the Delhi government contended that the petitions were not maintainable before the single judge, as they sought enforcement of a statement made by a politician, without any supporting law or policy of the government.
The counsel for the petitioners submitted that the Chief Minister had not made his statement "in the air". He said that the authorities cannot enforce the DDMA order of March 29, 2020, which barred landlords from demanding rent while ignoring the statement made by the then Chief Minister.
In its 50-page verdict, the division bench rejected the Delhi government's contention that the assurance was merely a political statement, saying a Chief Minister's statement cannot be "lightly dismissed".
The court asserted the distinction between a statement made by a politician before being elected to public office and one made subsequently.
It clarified that the state government was free to take a policy decision on the assurance given by the former Chief Minister in his press conference.
The court further said that since the DDMA order of March 29, 2020, was never challenged, landlords cannot recover rent from their migrant tenants for the lockdown period.
On July 22, 2021, Justice Prathiba M Singh ruled that a Chief Minister's promise to citizens was legally enforceable. She directed the AAP government to decide within six weeks on Arvind Kejriwal's announcement that the state would pay rent on behalf of poor tenants unable to do so due to COVID-19.
The single-judge bench said the assurance was not a "political promise", as it was not made as part of an election rally but was a statement made by the Delhi Chief Minister.
"A statement given in a consciously held press conference, in the background of the lockdown announced due to the pandemic and the mass exodus of migrant laborers, cannot be simply overlooked."
"Proper governance requires the government to take a decision on the assurance given by the CM, and inaction on the same cannot be the answer," the single judge had said in its 89-page verdict.
The petitioners before the single-judge bench were daily wagers and workers who sought to enforce the promise made by Kejriwal as they were unable to pay rent to their landlords. A petition was also filed by a landlord for the enforcement of the assurance.
