THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The election to five out of eight standing committees of the city corporation has been postponed to Friday as the number of nominations received did not meet the required strength. The standing committees that await election include finance, development, health, works and education-sports.
In a major development, the Tax Appeal Standing Committee is set to decide its chairpersons through a draw of lots as the BJP and LDF have secured an equal number of seats on the panel.
The election process also saw two votes being declared invalid — one by BJP councillor R Sreelekha in the Town Planning Committee election and another by LDF councillor R P Sivaji in the Tax Appeal Standing Committee.
Meanwhile, the Welfare Standing Committee went uncontested after only 13 nominations were submitted, eliminating the need for polling. Corporation secretary Jahangir S told the TNIE that the required number of nominations was not received to form five committees.
“Each standing committee requires a fixed number of members — four of them need 13 members while the remaining committees need 12. Five committees are short of members and the remaining vacancies will be filled through a fresh round of nominations to be held on Friday,” he said.
As per rule 7(5) of the Standing Committee election guidelines, if insufficient nominations are received, the Corporation must conduct another round of elections within five days. If adequate nominations are still not submitted, councillors who are not currently part of any committee will be included to fill the remaining seats.
According to sources, despite securing a simple majority with support from the independent councillor, the BJP-led council wrestled with internal disagreements over the distribution of members across committees. Confusion prevailed in the BJP camp on Tuesday over which committee should be granted to the independent councillor.
A list finalised by the BJP members on Tuesday night proposed seven members in each committee except the Tax Appeal Committee. However, strong objections were raised by BJP councillors over a plan to concede the Tax Appeal chair to the opposition. The protest forced the leadership to revise the nominations.