The strike by municipal corporation employees in Delhi has gathered momentum, with doctors, nurses and engineers from the civic bodies planning to join the strike on Saturday. The Times of India reported that this will be the first time since Independence that all corporation employees in the capital will be on strike, and not just sections of it. Tourism Minister Kapil Mishra has alleged a salary scam in the corporations and said the Bharatiya Janata Party-led civic bodies are “not capable of clearing garbage”.

Civic body employees went on strike on Wednesday, demanding that their pending salaries be released. A High Court bench on Wednesday directed the Commissioner of Police to work with the municipal corporations to ensure that garbage was cleared. However, the Aam Aadmi Party has said it will find other ways of cleaning the city if workers do not resume their duties. AAP has also said it released funds for salaries, though workers have not been paid yet.

Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee president Ajay Maken on Friday accused the chief minister of not releasing funds for workers’ salaries, and said that the budget allocated to the municipal bodies has reduced, while the AAP government’s funds have increased. Responding to Arvind Kejriwal’s tweet on dissolving the municipal corporations, Maken said that was not a solution, and that if corporations can be dissolved, so could the Delhi government.