Farmers Movement Archive

Akali Dal, BJP get a raw deal in Mohali MC ward delimitation

In a major setback to Shiromani Akali Dal and Bharatiya Janata Party councillors, 70% seats held by them in the previous Mohali municipal corporation House have gone into ward delimitation or been reserved or deserved to their detriment ahead of the upcoming civic body elections in Punjab. The five-year term of the House ended on April 26 this year.The delimitation board constituted by the local bodies department to redraw boundaries of wards based on the recent census gave its final approval on Friday. The population under the MC’s jurisdiction has gone up from 1.64 lakh to 1.87 lakh. Among the 50 wards, 25 have been reserved for women besides five for scheduled castes (including two for women) and two for backward classes (men). While former Akali mayor Kulwant Singh’s Ward No. 49 has been converted to general from reserved (SC), his son Sarabjeet Singh Samana’s Ward No. 25 has been reserved for women.As many as 23 of 33 wards previously held by SAD-BJP have been affected, while wards of only two former Congress councillors have been converted to general category and the remaining 13 have been left untouched.Miffed over this, both SAD and BJP councillors are accusing the state’s Congress government of “dictatorship”.‘Done in undemocratic way’Mohali got a municipal council in 1984, which was upgraded to a corporation through a notification in January 2011. However, the elections were held after four years in 2015. While Congress had won from 15 wards, the SAD-BJP alliance got 23 seats. The Azad group, led by Kulwant Singh, won from 10 while two seats went to Independents. With the support of his group besides 14 Congress councillors and the two Independents, Kulwant was elected Mohali’s first mayor in August 2015. Two years later, the Azad group merged into the SAD. In the upcoming elections, the SAD and BJP will be contesting separately after their alliance at the Centre broke over the farm bills.Still waiting for the delimitation’s blueprint, Kulwant Singh said: “People of Mohali know who has done development work in the city.”During his tenure, Kulwant Singh remained at loggerheads with cabinet minister Balbir Singh Sidhu, who represents Mohali in the Punjab Vidhan Sabha, as the two were often engaged in a “credit war” over development works in the city.Former BJP councillor Arun Sharma, whose Ward No. 9 has been reserved for women, said: “We all worked with dedication in our wards for five years, and now they (Congress government) have shifted our wards. It has been done in an undemocratic way.” Justifying the delimitation, former Congress councillor Bharat Bhushan Mynee said: “The 2015 elections were held according to the 2014 population data. In six years, the population increased, especially in the new sectors, necessitating redrawing of ward boundaries.”

Hindustan Times

23-10-2020

City