CHANDIGARH: Sarabjit Kaur Dhillon of the Bharatiya Janata Party was on Saturday elected as the new mayor of Chandigarh after she defeated Anju Katyal of the Aam Aadmi Party by one vote, triggering a row and accusations of foul play.
Both Kaur and Katyal got 14 votes each but later one vote in the AAP candidate's favour was declared invalid, paving the way for Kaur's victory. Kaur is the wife of Jagtar Singh Dhillon, a former councilor. She entered politics after her husband’s ward was reserved for a woman candidate.
Soon after the results were declared, AAP councilors created a ruckus as they alleged that the BJP candidate had been favoured in the counting process. The AAP councilors tried to stop the new mayor from addressing the house and marshals had to be called in to restore order.
In the recent Chandigarh municipal corporation elections, the AAP emerged as the single largest party bagging 14 seats in a house of 36. The BJP came second with 12 seats, the Congress third with eight and the Shiromnai Akali Dal got only one seat. But a few days after the elections, Congress councilor Harpreet Kaur Babla joined the BJP along with her husband, pushing up the BJP’s number to 13.
In the mayoral polls on Saturday, Chandigarh member of parliament of the BJP, Kirron Kher, who has ex-officio vote, cast her vote for the saffron party, making the election a tie with 14 votes each in the AAP and BJP’s favour. The Congress and Akali Dal councilors abstained from voting. With one AAP vote being declared invalid, Kaur became the new mayor.
AAP's Jarnail Singh accused the BJP of murdering democracy. He said that the AAP's victory in the mayor’s election was certain but the BJP deliberately cancelled one vote.
Singh claimed that there was a clandestine understanding between the BJP and the Congress to defeat AAP in the mayoral elections. After winning only 12 seats in the elections, the BJP inducted a councilor from the Congress.