While the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and Congress won a moral and legal victory Tuesday, wresting the post of Chandigarh Municipal Corporation Mayor, they face a long road ahead. By the time the Supreme Court held the January 30 election that instated a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Mayor as invalid, the BJP had managed to win three AAP councillors to its side. This means that in the general house of the civic body, the BJP now has 17 councillors, the same as the AAP-Congress combine (whose numbers are down from 20 to 17). The BJP can additionally count on its Chandigarh MP Kirron Kher, the ex-officio member of the corporation, and the sole Akali Dal councillor. One of the immediate challenges before new Mayor Kuldeep Kumar Tita will be surviving a non-confidence motion in the House, with numbers skewed against him. There is also a question mark on the legality of the election of BJP councillors Kuljeet Sandhu and Rajinder Sharma as Senior Deputy Mayor and Deputy Mayor, respectively, given that they were picked unopposed after the AAP and Congress boycotted the polls over the disputed Mayor election. But even if elections are held again for the two posts – which seems likely – the BJP is well-placed to win them. As per legal experts, to win a no-confidence motion, Kuldeep Kumar must get a majority of the votes of the councillors in the house, plus two-third of those present and voting. A senior BJP leader said the party was confident of voting out Kuldeep Kumar as the Congress-AAP alliance remains fragile and is set to come apart under seat-sharing pressures of the Lok Sabha elections. “The BJP already has a simple majority in the house. If the alliance of the AAP and Congress falls apart, the Congress will definitely try to bring down the Mayor, and we will have the two-third numbers, even if all the 10 AAP councillors vote for Kuldeep. So there are several permutations and combinations,” the leader said. The BJP is also counting on Kuldeep Kumar being hamstrung due to a code of conduct for the Lok Sabha polls kicking in soon, leaving little in his powers beyond holding house meetings. “So he will be an ineffective Mayor, and by the time of the polls, the Congress-AAP alliance will also fall apart,” the BJP leader said. As per a BJP councillor, even if this fissure does not happen now, the Congress and AAP bonhomie is bound to collapse after the Lok Sabha elections. “In case the Congress performs badly, they will never let this AAP Mayor continue,” the councillor said. Even without a no-confidence motion being brought in, Kuldeep Kumar will have a hard time controlling a house in which the BJP has a majority. There are also nine nominated councillors who are affiliated to the BJP mostly, who are not allowed to vote in the Mayor election but can voice their opinion in the house. A BJP councillor said: “Kuldeep Kumar will have 26 voices speaking against his every decision. It will not be a walk in the park.” The councillor added that the two allies may fall apart even as early as when elections are held for the senior deputy mayor and deputy mayor. “If the Congress, which was promised the two posts within their alliance, loses, things will begin to fall apart.”
