NEW DELHI: The AAP ended 15 years of BJP’s rule in the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) in December 2022. In February 2023, Shelly Oberoi became the first mayor from the party and Mahesh Khichi was elected second mayor in November 2024.
However, there is strong possibility that the Opposition BJP in the MCD House may win mayoral election scheduled in April this year. The number is in favour of the BJP as it has 131 votes while the majority mark is 132-133. The ruling AAP has 122 votes and it can reach the majority mark only if the Congress and an independent councillor extend their support to the party.
After its victory in the recent Assembly elections, senior BJP leaders, including CM Rekha Gupta and Delhi unit chief, said that the party will soon have triple-engine government in the national capital as it is set to win mayoral election.
Factors such as absence of anti-defection law, nomination of MLAs by the Assembly Speaker, AAP MP Swati Maliwal’s strident opposition to Arvind Kejriwal’s party, rift between INDIA bloc allies Congress and AAP indicate that the BJP is likely to snatch the civic body from the AAP.
There are 250 wards in the MCD, of which 12 are vacant as 11 (BJP 7 & AAP 4) councillors were elected as MLAs while a councillor (BJP’s Kamaljeet Sehrawat) won the Lok Sabha election in June last year. Since election for the vacant seats will he held after mayoral polls, the current strength of councillors remains at 238. Also, 14 legislators, to be nominated by the Speaker, will have voting rights and 10 MPs (Lok Sabha 7 and Rajya Sabha 3) will participate in the mayor election.
As far as the current number is concerned, the BJP has 113 councillors, AAP 116, Congress 8 and 1 independent. After the 2022 MCD election, the AAP had 134 councillors, BJP 104, Congress 9 and 3 independents.