Sep 27, 2024 12:51 PM IST
Delhi Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief Virender Sachdeva said that the AAP has a majority in the MCD but it was running away from the election to the vacant seat
Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Manish Sisodia on Friday called municipal commissioner Ashwani Kumar’s election meeting notice for the vacant Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) standing committee seat “illegal” and said they would stay away from the process. He argued a bureaucrat cannot preside over the meeting of the elected corporation.
Sisodia likened Kumar to Anil Masih, the returning officer who was caught on camera defacing ballots cast in Chandigarh mayoral polls on January 30 that helped the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) win the election. The Supreme Court in February overturned the mayoral polls results and declared the AAP candidate the winner
Delhi BJP chief Virender Sachdeva said that the AAP has a majority in the MCD but it was running away from the election to the vacant seat. He added that AAP was responsible for the “murder of democracy” as key panels had not been formed over 21 months after the MCD polls.
“AAP, Arvind Kejriwal, and Manish Sisodia are murdering the democracy in MCD. You won the election…you have the majority still you are not letting the MCD elections take place. From the appointment of aldermen, zonal committee election, and the standing committee, courts have been forced to intervene to help MCD operate. Why are you running away from elections? They do not even trust their councillors,” Sachdeva said.
On Thursday, an impasse over the election for the last standing committee member could not be resolved despite an eight-hour-long stand-off, three adjournments, protests, and lieutenant governor VK Saxena’s intervention. AAP objected to an order from the municipal secretariat disallowing mobile phones inside the chamber.
Saxena invoked the seldom-used Delhi Municipal Corporation Act Section 487 directing that elections be completed by Thursday. He said deputy mayor Aaley Iqbal may be requested to preside over the meeting for the conduct of the election in case mayor Shelly Oberoi was unavailable or unwilling to do so. Saxena allowed the senior-most member to discharge the function in case both were unwilling or unavailable.
The municipal commissioner late on Thursday submitted a report to Saxena saying Oberoi had again refused to preside over the election. Iqbal and seniormost councillor Mukesh Goel (AAP) did not respond.
Around midnight, Saxena ordered that the election for the standing committee seat be held at 1pm on Friday while directing additional commissioner Jitender Yadav to preside over it.
Sisodia said Saxena ordered MCD commissioner to hold elections and the whole night the BJP councillors were present there, while those of AAP and Congress were absent. “Now, they want to conduct the election by 1pm under the supervision of additional commissioner of MCD. What Masih did in the Chandigarh mayoral elections, the same is being done. MCD commissioner is like Masih.”
The standing committee is a key panel that controls MCD’s purse. It has been at the centre of a political and legal tussle between the BJP and AAP for almost two years. Out of 18 standing committee members, 12 are elected through zonal wards committees. The House of councillors elects the remaining six directly. The BJP has nine members in the standing committee and the AAP eight.
The seat was left vacant when the BJP councillor Kamaljeet Sehrawat resigned after winning Lok Sabha polls.
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