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Chandigarh: AAP presses for anti- defection law
AAP leaders said that anti-defection law is a must to ensure complete transparency and to curb casteism, ideological deviation, and political horse-trading
Two days after UT administrator Gulab Chand Kataria approved that the elections of the mayor, senior deputy mayor, and deputy mayor will now be elected through a show of hands instead of the earlier secret-ballot method, the local unit of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Thursday held a press conference and demanded the immediate implementation of the Anti-Defection Law in the Chandigarh municipal corporation (MC).
In a press conference, Vijaypal Singh, president of the Chandigarh AAP unit along with city councillors Yogesh Dhingra, Hardeep Singh, Jaswinder Kaur, and party’s general secretary Omkar Singh Aulakh, said, “AAP has consistently fought for transparency and strengthening democracy in Chandigarh over the past year. After continuous engagement with the public, judiciary, administration, and even Parliament, the approval of the ‘Show of Hands’ voting system marks a shared victory of AAP and the people of Chandigarh.”
“But this reform represents 50% progress towards full democratic transparency. Anti-defection law is a must to ensure complete transparency and to curb casteism, ideological deviation, and political horse-trading”, the leaders added.
Leaders said that during the mayor elections on January 30, 2024, returning officer Anil Masih was caught on camera while tampering with 8 votes cast in favour of AAP–Congress alliance candidate Kuldeep Kumar Dhalor. “This incident was described by the Supreme Court as a ‘murder of democracy’. The election was cancelled and Dhalor was declared the mayor validly elected. In October 2024, AAP-Congress councillors led by Yogesh Dhingra, had approved an amendment to Regulation 6, recommending a shift from secret ballot to the ‘Show of Hands’ method for mayoral elections”, they added.
They said that AAP leaders then met deputy commissioner in January and had then filed a petition in the Punjab and Haryana high court, demanding that the proposed secret ballot election scheduled for January 24 be cancelled and held via the show of hand system. “Chandigarh MP Manish Tewari had also raised this issue in Parliament, advocating for a five-year mayoral term and open voting through the show of hands method at the national level,” they added.
