Removing Amritsar Mayor Karamjit Singh Rintu won't be easy for Congress now

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, March 11

Karamjit Singh Rintu may continue on the post of Mayor as the Aam Adami Party (AAP) won clear majority in the Assembly elections. Rintu along with three other councillors had defected from the Congress to the AAP three days before the elections.

The Congress councillors, who were repeatedly writing to the MC Commissioner to conduct the floor test and wanted to move a no-confidence motion, seems disheartened and may not make hard efforts to replace the Mayor.

As per the rules, the Mayor is a competent authority to convene a meeting and decide on the proposals and agendas. The councillors, even if they have a majority, cannot call a meeting, leave alone decide about agendas. However, councillors tabled their agenda during the House meeting.

“The Congress councillors have an absolute majority, but cannot call the meeting. We will prove the majority in an upcoming House meeting,” said a Congress councillor.

Mayor Karamjit Singh Rintu said, “They need a two-third majority to displace me from the post. The Congress is not able to prove it in the House. We have now five MLAs from the city which are also members of the House. I will continue till the end of the tenure of House.”

However, there are speculations that some other Congress councillors are joining the AAP before the Budget meeting, which is scheduled to be held on March 21.

When asked about it, Mayor Karamjit Singh Rintu denied such speculations.

Rintu was a prominent Congress leader, who joined the AAP just a few days before the poll. Political experts claimed that this shift of Rintu gave a major boost to the AAP in the Majha belt. The AAP leaders, who were expecting five seats from the Majha and only one seat from the city, got 16 seats from the Majha. The decision of Karamjit Singh Rintu hit the Congress and Navjot Singh Sidhu badly. Rintu has good base in the North and East constituencies from where Kunwar Vijay Pratap Singh and Jeevan Jyot Kaur won by a record margin.

What the rules say

As per the rules, the Mayor is a competent authority to convene a meeting and decide on the proposals and agendas. The councillors, even if they have a majority, cannot call a meeting, leave alone decide about agendas. However, councillors tabled their agenda during the House meeting

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