Amid the political parties such as Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) crying foul over the Punjab government’s notified delimitation of wards, the uncertainty is prevailing over the schedule of civic polls to be held in Amritsar, Ludhiana, Jalandhar and Patiala.
However, the sources said the elections may be held at anytime in December.
Interestingly, the ongoing row over delimitation of wards in civic bodies has put the government and legislators at loggerheads.
Sources said, most of the legislators have demanded a fresh delimitation citing the entire process ‘improper’.
Resultantly, the delimitation of Ludhiana municipal corporation has been put on hold while the delimitation for other three civic bodies is final.
“We are ready with everything. The final call regarding the announcement of date for civic polls will be taken by the Chief Minister,” Punjab Local Government Minister Navjot Singh Sidhu, told The Statesman.
Elections in four municipal corporations are over due after their five-year term expired in September.
The government has removed the mayors, all of the SAD-BJP combine and have appointed commissioners as officiating heads of these civic bodies.
The opposition had been objecting to this arrangement.
Former Patiala Mayor Amaninder Bajaj of SAD said the ruling Congress government dissolved the house in an arbitrary manner in September.
“Most of the city development works are hanging fire. The delimitation notified by government has highlighted its aim to get a hold in civic bodies. We are fully prepared to fight the elections but the government is not declaring the poll schedule,” he said.
In 2012, BJP had won seven seats in Patiala, which is two less than the previous time.
In Amritsar, despite SAD increasing its tally from 15 wards in 2007 to 24 wards in 2012, its tally was identical to that of the BJP, which also won in 24 wards, up from 17 in the 2007 civic body elections.
Congress is hoping to improve its tally in all four corporations.
Surinder Kaur, former Congress councilor from Jalandhar said, “It’s been barely seven months and the public sentiment is in favour of Congress. In the last election too, the party had done fairly well in the corporation elections in Jalandhar,” she said.
Meanwhile, AAP co-president Aman Arora said the Congress ruled government has manipulated the matrix of civic polls in its notification of delimitation.
“The government is busy in fabricating the civic polls to make safe roadmap for its own candidates. We will come with full force once the elections are announced which government deliberately delaying,” he said.