Denied tickets, dissidence brews in BJP

New Delhi: Dissidence seems to be brewing in the Delhi BJP with about 118 of its sitting councillors in no mood to follow the party dictate to not contest the upcoming civic elections in the national capital.

In the 272 wards of the three civic bodies, the BJP has 153 councillors. Sources said that the disgruntled councillors first held a three-hour closed door meeting in Civic Centre, the headquarter of North and South civic body, to chalk out their future course of strategy. There are indications that these councillors could join hands to form a new party to take on the BJP, Congress and AAP in the civic polls.

Since the BJP has decided to field neither their councillors nor their relatives in the civic polls, a large number of the sitting members are said to have contacted the Congress, which reportedly told them that it was not in a position to give them party tickets as it would hamper their campaign against the non-performance of the municipal bodies for 10 successive years in Delhi.

A councillor from the NDMC said that Tuesday morning they received a call from the Leader of the House asking them to attend the meeting. “After reaching the meeting, we came to know about its purpose. In the meeting, the options available to sitting BJP councillors were discussed after the party denied tickets to us,” he said.

Sharing the details of the meeting, one of the councillors said that it was unanimously decided that they will approach the party’s central leadership to reconsider the decision to deny ticket to all the sitting councillors. “Several councillors also suggested floating a new party,” he added.

After the meeting, all the councillors tried to meet Union minister M. Venkaiah Naidu and transport minister Nitin Gadkari, but failed to get their time due to the ongoing Parliament session and other prior commitments.

Later in the evening, they met three core committee members of the Delhi BJP and Union minister Vijay Goel, Lok Sabha member Pravesh Verma and Maheish Girri and requested them to convey their sentiments.

A councillor said that they assured their sentiments would be conveyed to the central leadership.

Party sources said that all three mayors, Shyam Sharma, Dr Sanjiv Nayyar, and Satya Sharma; leader of House in North and East corporation Vijay Prakash Pandey and Sanjay Jain; and standing committee chairmen Shailnder Singh Monti, Pravesh Wahi, and Jitender Chaudhary, are most vocal among all the councillors. There are rumours that the top leadership in the three civic bodies also met BJP president Amit Shah on Monday.