Despite Congress having majority councillors, BJP led in Solan city

Ambika Sharma

Solan, June 7

BJP candidates secured a lead in majority of the wards under the jurisdiction of the Solan Municipal Corporation (MC), though the Congress has nine of the 17 councillors. Besides, local MLA DR Shandil is the senior-most Cabinet minister.

In Ward-1, BJP candidate Suresh Kashyap secured 1,001 votes while Congress’ Vinod Sultanpuri got 776 votes. In Ward-2, Kashyap polled 737 votes while Sultanpuri got 566 votes. The situation was no different in Ward-3, where the BJP secured 806 votes and the Congress got 629 votes. In Ward-4, the BJP secured 633 votes while the Congress got 482 votes.

A similar situation was seen in Ward-5, where the BJP polled 437 votes, while the Congress got merely 280 votes.

In wards-6,7,8,9 and 10, the BJP polled 3,077 votes, as against 2,405 of the Congress.

In wards-11, 12, 13, 14 and 15, the BJP secured 2,527 votes, as against the 2219 bagged by the Congress.

The Congress secured a lead in merely three wards — 7, and both booths of wards-14 and 15.

Wards-2, 3, 5, 6, 9 and 13 are held by the BJP, while Ward-1 is represented by an independent candidate.

Usha Sharma, the civic body’s mayor, represents Ward-12.

She, too, could not secure a lead for the Congress, as the BJP managed to poll 670 votes from the ward as against the 511 polled by the Congress.

The BJP’s Deputy Mayor Meera Anand, on the contrary, managed to secure a lead from her ward.

The internal bickering within various factions of the Congress has created an animosity within the party in Solan. A few councillors were seen campaigning in their wards for the Lok Sabha polls.

Leadership crisis was seen in the city and block-level party functionaries failed to lead effective campaigning in their wards leading to party’s debacle.

Even the few meetings convened by the local MLA and Minister For Health And Family Welfare DR Shandil at Solan failed to yield any result as they were marred by the lack of direction and effective leadership with chaos dominating the scenario.

The merged areas — comprising Basal, Anji and Kather — polled 1,388 votes in favour of the BJP, as against the 1,200 polled by the Congress.

Kashyap secured the highest lead of 52, 106 from Solan district with Solan Assembly segment contributing a share of 32,125 votes as against 27,109 polled by the Congress’s Vinod Sultanpuri, who hails from the district.