Upset over the decision to appoint Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) councillor Damanpreet Singh as leader of opposition in municipal corporation, eight of the fourteen councillors have written a letter to AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal, co-in-charge of Chandigarh unit Kulwant Singh, AAP’s Punjab and Chandigarh co-in-charge Jarnail Singh alleging favouritism.
In the 35-member MC House, both the AAP and the BJP have 14 members each, while six councillors are from the Congress and one from the SAD.
Last year, Yogesh Dhingra was leader of the opposition.
Speaking about the latest developments with HT, AAP councillors said, “We were told that there will be a meeting of all 14 councillors to appoint the leader of opposition, but today we were shocked that they appointed Damanpreet Singh as leader of opposition.”
Chandigarh AAP president Prem Garg, meanwhile, said, “We have not made any official announcement and told Damanpreet Singh verbally that he will be appointed as leader of opposition and he posted that on social media. A few AAP councillors resented this and gave a letter. The issue will be sorted out as we will be calling the meeting of the councillors soon.”
A copy of the aforementioned letter stated, “We 14 municipal councillors went into the elections with utmost dedication and sincerity having full faith in the party and having faith in the ideology of the party and we always committed to work with the party by keeping in discipline of the party. But, we came to know that without the consent of the undersigned fourteen municipal councillors the election of Leader of the opposition party has been done, which is not good in the interest of the party and as well as injustice with us.”
{{/usCountry}}A copy of the aforementioned letter stated, “We 14 municipal councillors went into the elections with utmost dedication and sincerity having full faith in the party and having faith in the ideology of the party and we always committed to work with the party by keeping in discipline of the party. But, we came to know that without the consent of the undersigned fourteen municipal councillors the election of Leader of the opposition party has been done, which is not good in the interest of the party and as well as injustice with us.”
{{/usCountry}}“It is also intimated that during the elections of Mayor we the undersigned councillors performed jointly. But, the action of election of LoP in Chandigarh at your own level will create a groupism in the party of Chandigarh Unit, which is totally against the interests of the party,” it further read.