Mayoral polls by show of hands: MP backs MC move

Chandigarh: Backing the resolution passed in the MC’s general house meeting on Tuesday to hold the upcoming election of mayor, senior deputy mayor and deputy mayor in Chandigarh municipal corporation by show of hands, local MP Manish Tewari has urged Punjab governor and UT administrator to approve the resolution soon. Mentioning Supreme Court’s intervention in the mayoral poll, Tewari termed the resolution as path breaking, “which will ensure fair and transparent mayoral elections”.
Tewari in his X handle wrote, “Now the Ball is in His Excellency Governor Punjab and Administrator Gulab Chand Kataria’s Court. The MC, Chandigarh House passed a path breaking resolution that the next election for the mayor, senior deputy mayor and deputy mayor will happen by a show of hands rather than by secret ballot. This has been done to ensure that the possibility of the unseemly situation that happened last year in the Mayor election that necessitated the intervention of the Supreme Court gets obviated and everything happens in fair and transparent manner. I congratulate AAP councillor Yogesh Dhingra for moving the resolution and other Congress and AAP councillors for seeing it through. I urge Chandigarh administrator to approve the resolution at the earliest.”
Referring to mayoral elections, held in Feb 2024, which brought national attention on Chandigarh due to the alleged malpractice in the voting, the MC house on Tuesday decided to elect the next mayor, senior deputy mayor and deputy mayor by show of hands instead of a secret ballot. BJP councillors strongly opposed the move and even walked out of the house initially, but they later returned to the house. Major arguments took place between the ruling AAP-Congress and BJP camps.