BJP’s Rajinder Sharma is mayor of Jammu, Billoria his deputy

Jammu, October 21

Rajinder Sharma and Baldev Singh Billoria, both of the BJP, were elected mayor and deputy mayor, respectively, of the Jammu Municipal Corporation (MC) on Friday. It was a direct contest between the saffron party and the Congress.

The Congress boycotted the polls, opposing the open ballot. It should have been a secret ballot instead, it said. A total of 59 votes were cast for the mayor’s post and 57 went in favour of the BJP candidate. Congress candidate Dwarka Nath Choudhary got only one vote while another vote was declared invalid.

Congress against open ballot process

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• The Congress boycotted the election in protest against the open ballot voting process. Its mayoral candidate Dwarka Nath Choudhary got only one vote.
• The party termed the election process undemocratic. A total of 59 votes were cast for the mayor’s post and 57 went in favour of the BJP candidate.

Congress candidate Sonika Sharma lost the deputy mayor’s seat to Billoria.

The MC has a total of 75 councillors out of which the BJP has 44 and the Congress 13. The rest are independents.

Congress spokesperson Ravinder Sharma stated it was against the democracy to change the set procedure of secret ballot to open polling. “Councillors of our party boycotted the elections against this undemocratic rule,” he said. He said the BJP was taking undemocratic decisions one after another.

Both the posts had fallen vacant in September after resignation of BJP members—Mayor Chander Mohan Gupta and Deputy Mayor Purnima Sharma.

Ravinder Raina, UT president of the BJP, said the elections showed that even non-BJP councillors supported party’s mayor and deputy mayor. “The result of the Assembly elections in J&K will be on similar lines,” claimed Raina.

He said open ballot were arranged as per law and there was nothing unlawful or undemocratic in it.