Taking a tough stand, the Delhi government has also said that it will not do anything of this sort and the MCD should pay up its outstanding dues before making any such claims. At present, the Delhi government is running 350 middle schools in MCD buildings. Apart from this, there are 60 other buildings in which the MCD and the Delhi government are both running their schools, simultaneously. These middle schools were handed over to the government by the MCD in 1969 and both parties agreed the schools would continue to function in MCD buildings.

Shanti Desai, leader of the MCD house, however, adds that when these schools were handed over, the government had also agreed to pay the electricity dues and maintain these buildings.

Over the years, however, the government had not fulfilled either of these promises and as a consequence the MCD was losing crores. ``If the government can ask us to start paying back our loans of Rs 228 crore and threaten to deduct them from the Plan Funds, we can also ask them to pay to improve our financial position,'' Desai pointed out. Desai further said the Delhi Vidyut Board (DVB) had disconnected the electricity supply to many of these schools because the government had not paid these bills for years. He pointed out that while the revenue generated from these schools was pocketed by the government, the water, electricity and maintenance bills had to be paid by the MCD. He said that he had met Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit and she had assured them that these buildings would be handed back to them.

Municipal Commissioner V.K. Duggal said he had met former education secretary Neeru Nanda in this regard and had asked the government to pay the dues for the past 30 years or buy these buildings from the MCD at the present rates.

He said that after Nanda's transfer, he had written to the education department to settle this matter as soon as possible. Dismissing these claims as `political', Delhi Education Minister Dr Narendra Nath said the Congress had neither taken these schools from the government and would neither hand them back. ``If they really wanted these schools back, they should have initiated proceedings during the tenure of the BJP government. They have politicised the matter because the Congress is in power,'' he said.

Dr Nath said these 350 schools were handed to the government when the Jansangh was in power and no one knows the exact terms of the agreement which took place 30 years ago. He added that the MCD should first pay Rs 5 crore that the government had paid as electricity dues for those 60 buildings in which the MCD and the government were both running schools, simultaneously. Apart from this, the government spent crores on salaries of teachers, electricity and maintenance dues which the MCD seemed to have conveniently forgotten, he observed.