SUKHDEEP TEJA ELECTED FIRST MAYOR OF BATALA

BATALA/MOGA: Congress’ Sukhdeep Singh Teja was unanimously elected as the first mayor of the Batala municipal corporation (MC) on Monday.

The election was held after the MC’S first house meeting that was convened by Jalandhar division commissioner Gurpreet Kaur to administer the oath to all 50 elected councillors. In 2019, the state government had upgraded Batala municipal council to municipal corporation. In the February polls, Congress managed to win 36 of the total 50 wards. Besides Teja, Sunil Sareen and Chander Kanta were elected as senior deputy mayor and deputy mayor.

Cong fails to find Moga mayoral candidate

The ruling Congress has failed to find the mayoral nominee for the Moga municipal corporation despite having majority in the civic body due to a tussle between the state party leadership and the local MLA oven choice of the candidate.

The deadline for the appointment for the post has elapsed as the state government issued a notification on April 2 asking to complete the process of selection of mayors within 14 days.

Of a total of 50 seats, the Congress won from 20 wards while 10 winner independent candidates joined the party later. While the party leadership insisted on an experienced person for the post in view of the upcoming Punjab assembly elections, MLA Harjot Kamal wanted to have mayor of his choice, it is learnt.

Minister Bharat Bhushan Ashu, a member of the state committee for selection of mayors, got annoyed with the MLA when he visited Moga to talk to the local leadership and councillors last week. Parampal Takhtupura, chairman of Nihal Singh Wala market committee, said, “The MLA wants a dummy candidate but we need an experienced candidate for the development of the city. Therefore, we requested minister Ashu and the party leadership to take a decision keeping this in mind.”