Delhi Mayor Election: House Adjourned Without Electing Mayor Amid Scuffle
Delhi, 6th January 2023: The House had to be adjourned due to a scuffle between the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) councillors amid the ongoing election for the Mayor of the capital Delhi. Now, the election of the Delhi Mayor will be held on the date of the upcoming House. The date will be decided by Deputy Governor Vinay Kumar Saxena.
Delhi was going to get a mayor today, i.e. on Friday, about a month after the election. But due to the first oath being administered to the nominated members, an uproar began. BJP councillors also came forward when AAP councillors protested. Due to this, fighting and scuffling started between the councillors of both parties. During this, chairs were also thrown from both sides and tables were broken.
The proceedings of the House were stopped twice to stop the uproar, but it continued from both sides. The House had to be adjourned due to the uproar. This has happened for the first time in the history of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi that the House was adjourned on the day of the Mayor’s election without the Mayor’s election.
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has also reacted to the adjournment of the house after the uproar. He tweeted that Article 243R of the Constitution prevents nominated members from voting, and trying to get them to vote in the House is unconstitutional.
Amidst the uproar, these four nominated councillors took an oath
Vinod Sehrawat
Laxman Arya
Mukesh Mann
Sunit Chauhan
Amidst the uproar between Aam Aadmi Party and BJP councillors at the Civic Centre, Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia tweeted how low BJP members will stoop to hide their misdeeds in the MCD. He said that elections should be postponed; the illegal appointment of the presiding officer, the illegal appointment of nominated councillors, and now the public’s elected councillors should not be sworn in. “If you cannot respect the verdict of the public, then why the elections?” he questioned.
BJP MP Manoj Tiwari questioned why the Aam Aadmi Party was scared. “You are morally defeated. Do they feel their corporators will not support their party?” he asked.
AAP councillor Praveen Kumar said that BJP is doing hooliganism. “Instead of the elected corporators, the nominated members are sworn in first. When we opposed this and demanded that the first elected councillors be sworn in, there was an uproar,” he said.
The BJP and AAP are blaming each other for the ruckus at the Civic Centre. BJP MP and Union Minister Meenakshi Lekhi said the ruckus is being created by AAP corporators as nothing is known about the rules. “When they are in majority, what are they afraid of?” he asked. He said, “Your MPs do the same in Rajya Sabha.”
The election of a mayor, deputy mayor and six members of the standing committee will be held at Civic Center, the headquarters of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) along with the oath of office and secrecy to the winning councillors. On 7th December, the results of the MCD elections were declared. Aam Aadmi Party won 134 seats, and BJP won 104 seats. Congress got seats, while others got three seats.
