Shiv Sena to head four civic committees yet again

Mumbai: For the third consecutive year, the Shiv Sena is set to head four key committees of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) i.e. standing, improvements, education and Brihanmumbai Electricity Supply and Transport (BEST) committees. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has declared its full support.

After the BJP-Shiv Sena alliance, it was expected that the BJP would head the committees’ share of power however the party has taken a softer stand. The leaders of the BJP said that they were following what chief minister Devendra Fadnavis told them.

In the BMC elections held in 2017, the two parties fought elections separately. The Shiv Sena had 93 corporators while BJP had 82. The two parties, however, formed the civic body together and BJP decided to take the stand as a “watch dog” with the Sena heading all committees.

Present standing committee chairman, Yashwant Jadhav, said, “It was decided in the meeting of Sena president Uddhav Thackeray and the CM that we will head the committees this year.” While, former deputy major, Alka Kerkar from the BJP said, “We are following what the CM said. This year, we will continue our stand as ‘watchdog’. We can head ward committees,” she added.

The four Sena corporators who filed nomination forms Monday are Yashwant Jadhav for the standing committee, Sadanand Parab for the improvements committee, Anjali Naik for the education committee and Arun Patankar for the BEST committee. The formal announcement would be made in Wednesday’s special committee meeting through a show of hands.