BMC Polls to be Held in Jan-Feb Next Year If Pandemic is Under Control: Mayor Kishori Pednekar

Election to the Mumbai civic body, Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), will be held next year in January-February if the pandemic crisis is under control, Mayor Kishori Pednekar said on Tuesday. If the situation does not improve adequately, the polls will be postponed, she added.

Pednekar’s statement came hours after the BJP’s Mumbai unit alleged the ruling Shiv Sena was conspiring to postpone the elections to the Mumbai civic body, due next February, citing the pandemic situation and possibility of a third wave. Party leader Ashish Shelar said the Sena was trying to get an extension to the current governing body of the BMC so that it could receive a “cut” in the Rs 20,000 crore tender to be floated for setting up a sewage treatment plant.

The Bandra west MLA also alleged prevalence of “cut (money)” practice for tenders under the watch of the Sena which is the ruling party in the BMC for nearly three decades.

“The BJP is against allowing any extension to the current governing body of the BMC,” he said. The Sena and the BJP, which were ruling partners in Maharashtra from 2014 to 2019, had contested the Mumbai civic polls held in February 2017, separately.

In the 227-member BMC, the Sena has 97 corporators and the BJP 83. The BJP, however, has made its intentions clear to step up its challenge in the 2022 BMC elections to oust the Sena.

“If the BMC elections are announced the next year, the BJP will contest as per the given framework and adhere to the COVID-19 protocol,” Shelar, a former minister in the Devendra Fadnavis cabinet, said.

Stating that the Sena has betrayed the citizens of Mumbai which suffers due to water-logging almost every monsoon, Shelar said, “The party (Sena) promised that it won’t allow inundation of Mumbai, but it has not set up flood gates in all the crucial points in the city.”

In a veiled swipe at Worli MLA Aaditya Thackeray and his Chief Minister father Uddhav Thackeray, Shelar said all the developments are taking place in Worli only.

“The BMC is prioritising and concentrating works only in select areas in the city. The works like (installing) powerful pumps to drain out rainwater and replacing old pipes with new ones have taken place in Kalanagar only,” he alleged. The private residence of Sena president Thackeray is located in the Kalaganar area in suburban Bandra.

The Shiv Sena heads the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) government in Maharashtra with the NCP and the Congress. The BJP is the largest opposition party in the state Legislative Assembly.

(With PTI inputs)

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