Municipal House fails to elect Delhi mayor for third time in a month; AAP cries foul, to move SC

Now, elections to the posts of mayor, deputy mayor and Standing Committee members will be held simultaneously

The municipal House in Delhi on Monday failed to elect a mayor for the third time in a row in a month, following ruckus over the decision to allow aldermen to vote in the mayoral poll, even as the AAP alleged a "planned conspiracy" by the BJP to stall the process and said it would move the Supreme Court to seek a "court-monitored" election.

The House has witnessed unprecedented developments since January 6 when it had convened for the first time after the high-stakes civic polls and adjourned in vain following acrimonious exchanges between members of the BJP and the AAP.

After the third session too was adjourned by presiding officer and BJP councillor Satya Sharma, the issue has snowballed into a face-off between the AAP and the BJP with both the sides indulging in a blame game.

The AAP alleged that the mayoral election could not be held on Monday as the BJP is "strangulating democracy and the Constitution of India", while the saffron party accused the Aam Aadmi Party of coming out with excuses to stall the mayoral poll.

The House convened at around 11.30 am, after a delay of about half an hour, and the Presiding Officer announced that the aldermen will be allowed to vote in elections to the posts of mayor, deputy mayor and six members of the standing committee of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), which will be held simultaneously.

Sharma made a reference to a 2016 High Court ruling in the North Delhi Municipal Corporation vs Onika Mehrotra and others case.

No sooner had she made the announcements, it drew protests from AAP councillors. Veteran politician and party's leader in House, Mukesh Goel, stood up from his seat, and said aldermen can't vote, and even stepped into the Well of the House to hand over a document to Sharma.

As the chorus of protest grew, BJP councillors started raising slogans and asked AAP members to not prevent the mayoral poll.

Soon after the slogans reduced in intensity, the presiding officer said AAP councillors Akhilesh Tripathi and Sanjeev Jha should not be allowed to vote because they have corruption allegations against them, drawing a sharp reaction from the AAP councillors.

BJP councillors then started protesting, demanding the removal of Tripathi and Jha from the House.

The MLAs in the House are among the 14 AAP legislators nominated by the Delhi Assembly Speaker to the MCD in December.

As the commotion grew, the presiding officer announced that "the House stands adjourned till the next date".

AAP leaders and councillors sat, rather stoically in the seats, as BJP members walked out of the House's chamber named after the first mayor of Delhi -- Aruna Asaf Ali.

Later at a press conference held at the Civic Centre -- the towering MCD headquarters in the heart of Delhi -- AAP Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh, party MLA Atishi and AAP's MCD in-charge Durgesh Pathak tore into the BJP, saying they have decided to go to the Supreme Court seeking a time-bound and court-monitored election for the Delhi mayor.

"Today, through media, people have seen what is being done... It is clear that the presiding officer is working on the directions of the BJP, and there is a planned conspiracy to not let the mayoral election take place," Singh alleged.

"We will now go to the Supreme Court and raise the matter of aldermen being allowed to vote, and other issues," he said.

"The mayoral election was not held today as the BJP is strangulating democracy and the Constitution of India. The presiding officer allowed aldermen to vote in mayoral poll, which is wrong as per the Constitution and is against democracy.

"She also said simultaneously elections will be held for mayor, deputy mayor and six members of the Standing Committee, which is also wrong too, as the agenda said, mayoral election will be held first," Singh told reporters.

The AAP leaders said the high court that the presiding officer referred to was "wrongly quoted" by her.

"The double-bench order of the Delhi High Court says that aldermen have no right to vote. Then on what basis it was being referred to in the House," Atishi asked, and flashed a copy of the court order during the press conference.

"We will go to the Supreme Court, and we will go today itself so that the mayoral elections can be held in a court-monitored manner. Our demands are that the mayoral election should be held in a time-bound manner in the next two weeks and the aldermen should not be allowed to vote," she said

AAP's leader in House Goel alleged that the presiding officer was trying to do things that "violate the Constitution and the DMC Act".

"Since 1997, BJP has ruled for 21 years in the MCD, except for the five-year term of Congress from 2002-2007. This is sheer politics to not let a party, which has been given the mandate of people, to have its rightful mayor," he said.

According to the Delhi Municipal Corporation (DMC) Act, 1957, the mayor and the deputy mayor are to be elected in the very first session of the House after the civic polls. However, it's been two months since the municipal elections were held on December 4 and Delhi is yet to get a mayor.

The second municipal House held on January 24, was briefly adjourned after the oath-taking ceremony, and was later adjourned till next date by the presiding officer.

After the House was adjourned on Monday again, BJP members blamed the AAP for the stalemate.

BJP MP Harsh Vardhan, who came to the House on Monday, however, said the aldermen have been "given the right to vote by a court" and the "presiding officer is doing everything as per the law".

"My appeal to the councillors, irrespective of whether they belong to the AAP or the BJP is that wisdom should prevail upon them and they should ensure that the voting takes place in an amicable manner," he said.

Atishi claimed the BJP had planned to disrupt the proceedings so that the House could be adjourned.

The politics around the mayoral election had heated up even before the House began on Monday.

Before the session, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia alleged that the BJP had instructed its councillors to create a ruckus like the last time to stall the mayoral election.

Delhi BJP working president Virendra Sachdeva then retorted that it was the AAP which had asked its councillors to do so, and Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal will be "responsible" if the House is adjourned on Monday.

Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee president Anil Kumar alleged that the AAP has "betrayed" the people of Delhi, which gave it a clear majority in the MCD polls.

The AAP had emerged as a clear winner in the December 4 polls, bagging 134 wards and ending the BJP's 15-year rule in the civic body. The BJP won 104 wards to finish second, while the Congress won nine seats in the 250-member municipal House.