Chandigarh mayor resigns, three AAP councillors join BJP

Chandigarh mayor resigns, three AAP councillors join BJP

BJP’s Chandigarh Mayor Manoj Sonkar, whose election last month was marred by allegations of vote tampering by the presiding officer, resigned from the post citing “moral grounds” on Sunday, a day before the matter is scheduled to come up in the Supreme Court for hearing.

Incidentally, this came on a day three AAP councillors joined the BJP — a development that will now give the BJP an edge over the AAP-Congress coalition in the fresh mayoral election to be held after Sonkar’s resignation.

AAP councillors Neha Musawat, Poonam Devi and Gurcharan Kala joined the BJP in Delhi in the presence of senior party leaders. “I am the most educated and the AAP had promised to make me the mayoral candidate. I was surprised when Kuldeep Kumar was declared the (AAP-Congress) candidate. I am impressed by what Prime Minister Narendra Modi has done for the poor and Dalits,” Musawat told reporters in Delhi.

Sonkar had won against Kumar in the January 30 election after presiding officer Anil Masih declared eight votes as invalid. Kumar approached the Supreme Court, which on February 5 took a serious note of the presiding officer’s conduct during the election, and asked him to appear in court on the next date of hearing on Monday.

Reacting to the party councillors switching sides, AAP Chandigarh in-charge Sunny Ahluwalia alleged that the three were threatened to join the BJP. “The entire country knows what happened on January 30 and that 20 votes were polled in the favour of our candidate. Now, they have threatened our councillors and made them join. Everyone knows what is happening and how they have threatened them,” he said.

With the three joining the party, the BJP’s councillors’ strength goes up to 17 from 14. Along with this, they have the vote of BJP MP Kirron Kher and the lone SAD councillor’s vote taking the number of votes to 19.

On the other hand, the AAP-Congress strength in the 36-member general house has been reduced to 17 – with 10 AAP members and 7 from the Congress.

Confirming the resignation of Sonkar, which will now bring fresh mayoral polls, Chandigarh BJP chief Jatinder Malhotra told The Indian Express: “The mayor resigned on moral grounds. AAP and Congress were vitiating the atmosphere by levelling baseless allegations of tampering the votes. Now when fresh polls will be held, people will get to know who takes the majority.”

Sources said a meeting of senior office-bearers of the BJP took place in Delhi with the party high command, following which the top leadership asked Sonkar to resign immediately.

There were apprehensions among a section of BJP leaders of the possibility of the Supreme Court passing adverse remarks on Monday, therefore it was felt that Sonkar should resign, sources said.

A few days ago, the Chandigarh BJP had dropped Masih, the presiding officer, who has been under fire for allegedly defacing ballot papers, from its minority cell.

The Congress and AAP have been seeking the removal of Sonkar, alleging foul play in the mayoral election. It alleged that Sonkar had won after Masih scribbled on ballot papers and invalidated eight votes of the Congress-AAP combine.

In the last hearing, the Supreme Court had said that it was “a mockery of democracy”. Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud had said, “We will not allow democracy to be murdered like this.”

The Chandigarh mayoral election is significant for the AAP-Congress alliance, which was announced just three days ahead of the initial date of voting on January 18. AAP MP Raghav Chadha had declared that this would be the first win of the INDIA bloc.

However, on January 18, the councillors were turned away due to the sudden illness of Masih, the presiding officer. The UT administration then sought to postpone the polls to February 6 following which the AAP mayoral candidate Kuldeep Kumar approached the Punjab and Haryana High Court, which intervened to reschedule the polls on January 30.

After the polls, in which BJP’s Sonkar emerged victorious, getting 16 votes against AAP-Congress candidate’s 12, the Opposition sought relief in the High Court. When interim relief was denied, it approached the Supreme Court. Videos of Masih allegedly scribbling on ballot papers surfaced, prompting the Supreme Court to summon Masih for appearance on Monday.

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