The Supreme Court (SC) on Friday slammed the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government over its proposal of providing free Metro servicesto women and questioned its financial implications.

Asserting that the state government should be careful whilespending the common man's money, the apex court pointed out that such freeservices schemes could result in huge losses for Delhi Metro Rail Corporation(DMRC).

The Supreme Court made the observation while hearing a pleafiled by petitioner MC Mehta who has opposed the Delhi government's move.

This comes after Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal onJune 3 announced its plan to make Delhi metro rides free for women in an aim toensure their safety. "On all DTC buses, cluster buses and metro trainswomen will be allowed to travel free of cost so that they have a safe travelexperience and can access modes of transport which they were not able to, dueto high prices," CM Kejriwal had said while addressing a press conferencein the national capital.

Kejriwal had said that the plan will be brought into actionin the next two-three months. He had added that the Delhi government will bearthe expenditure of the subsidy being given to women and lashed out at theCentral government for not cooperating.

Critics including the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), hadslammed such a move and said that it was only due to Assembly election in Delhiin 2020. The cost-effectiveness of it was also questioned while many women saidthat they were not in need of any preferential treatment.

On July 27, Centre rejected Delhi government's proposal tomake commuting in the city's Metro free for women and asked it to look atalternate ways to ensure women's safety and access to the transport network.

Metro has been one of the major points of friction betweenthe AAP and the BJP. The issue of hiking ticket prices has been a massive boneof contention between the two while the Centre on Wednesday had asked Delhigovernment to reconsider its decision not to start work on Phase 4. The AAPgovernment reportedly wants HUA ministry to revise its approval in tune withits own dispensation's proposal - a demand the Centre is not ready to accept.

Meanwhile, the SC on Friday in a relief to the Delhigovernment directed the Centre to allocate Rs 600 crore to procure land forPhase-4 of the Delhi Metro.