F&CC nominations: Differences within Congress, BJP surface

Besides the mayor, who heads the committee, there are five other members in the F&CC. As six nominations were filed on Monday — two each from the Congress, BJP and nominated councillors – elections will be held on Friday unlike last year, when only five members had filed nomination.

Sources said the Congress high command wanted only one councillor to be nominated. However, both Subhash Chawla and Satish Kainth went file nominations.

According to Chawla, this was due to miscommunication among party members. “I got a message from the mayor’s office and filed my nomination in the morning. I did not know that Kainth is also standing as a candidate. There was some miscommunication which will be resolved soon,” said Chawla.

Kainth, meanwhile, said he was not aware of anyone else from his party filing nomination. He said, “These elections are not fought on party symbols and anybody can contest. I got a nod from the party high command.”

On the other hand, BJP councillors met during the day to finalise names of candidates. However, during the meeting four councillors —SAD’s Harjinder Kaur, former senior deputy mayor Heera Negi, Asha Kumari Jaswal and Rajinder Kaur Rattu — said they wanted to contest. There were arguments over the selection of candidates, which was resolved to let Jaswal and Rattu file nominations.

Leader of Opposition Arun Sood said, “By not giving the ticket to Kainth, the Congress has insulted the Dalit community. It shows that the Congress is only interested in vote-bank politics. We have given the ticket to Rattu to show our respect for the community.”

Nominated councillors Surinder Bahga and Babu Lal are the other two candidates in the fray.