Chandigarh to get new Mayor today

Dushyant Singh Pundir

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, January 7

The city will get a new Mayor tomorrow. The Municipal Corporation (MC) House will witness a direct contest between the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) for the post of Mayor, Senior Deputy Mayor and Deputy Mayor. The poll will be held tomorrow at 11 am.

In the 35-member House, AAP has 14 members, the Congress seven and the BJP 13, including Harpreet Kaur Babla, wife of former Congress leader Devinder Singh Babla who switched over to the saffron party, besides one vote of local MP Kirron Kher.

As the Congress has already declared to abstain from voting, the vote of the lone SAD councillor will play a crucial role in deciding the fate of the candidates in the fray for the three posts. Hardeep Singh, city SAD president and councillor, however, has not revealed whether he will vote or not?

Fearing poaching by rivals, all three parties had moved their councillors out of Chandigarh and they were kept under close vigil.

AAP first shifted its councillors to Delhi and then to Barog in Himachal Pradesh.

Sources said AAP councillors, who were putting up at Hotel Barog Heights in Solan district, returned to the city in the evening.

The sources said all AAP councillors were huddled up in a hotel in the Industrial Area in the city and would proceed to the MC office directly from the hotel.

Meanwhile, the BJP shifted its councillors to Shimla and today they returned to the city to cast vote in the elections.

However, the Congress, which took its councillors to Jaipur, is not expected to even attend the House meeting. Till the filing of the report, they had not left from Jaipur.

They are expected to reach the city after the poll is over.

AAP has fielded Anju Katyal for the post of Mayor and Prem Lata and Ram Chander Yadav for the posts Senior Deputy Mayor and Deputy Mayor, respectively. Meanwhile, Sarabjit Kaur is the BJP’s candidate for the post of Mayor, while Dalip Sharma and Anup Gupta will be contesting for the posts of Senior Deputy Mayor and Deputy Mayor, respectively.

Both Anju and Sarabjit are first-timers. The post of Mayor is reserved for a woman councillor in the first year of the new MC House.

In its debut MC elections in Chandigarh, AAP won 14 seats and the BJP strength was reduced to 12 seats from the 20 it had won in 2016.

In the MC elections held on December 24, the Congress tally had gone up to eight from four in 2016. However, it lost its ward 10 councillor Harpreet to the BJP after she and her husband, Devinder Singh Babla, joined the BJP.

Now, in the full House of 36, comprising one vote of the Chandigarh MP and 35 councillors, the BJP and the AAP have 14 votes each, the Congress is left with seven votes and the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) has one vote.

Cong councillors may not attend meeting

The Congress, which took its councillors to Jaipur, is not expected to even attend the House meeting. Till the filing of the report, they had not left from Jaipur. They are expected to reach the city after the poll is over.