BJP and Congress Walk Together as They Move to Dethrone Srinagar’s Mayor

Srinagar: The Srinagar’s municipality is caught up in a strong turbulence as its member corporators are crossing over party lines, ideologies and mandates to install a new chief for the body.

In a bid to remove Srinagar Mayor Junaid Azim Mattu, the corporators in Srinagar Municipal Corporation have moved a no-confidence vote against the head here on Tuesday.

The move comes a day after the corporators moved a similar vote against the Deputy Mayor Sheikh Imran. Imran, however, resigned from his post on the same day as his corporators rallied against him.

According to SMC’s Mudasir Hussain Banday, who is currently holding the secretary’s charge in the body, Imran has submitted his resignation. “47 corporators had submitted no-confidence against the deputy mayor,” Banday told NewsClick.

Banday added that 40 corporators have submitted their no-confidence against the city mayor.

The secretary said that they are scrutinising the application against the mayor and are likely to convene a special meeting to decide on the floor-test in coming days.

Imran is currently serving detention at a government accommodation along with scores of other politicians of the valley since August 5, as government unilaterally abrogated Article 370 in the region and bifurcated the erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir into two union territories.

The corporators, who moved no-confidence against the deputy mayor, belonged to Indian National Congress, PDP, National Conference and People’s Conference, of which Imran is a member himself.

In the letter dated December 23, 2019, the Deputy Mayor Imran has held Mayor Mattu responsible for his resignation. Imran has leveled accusations of “corruption and nepotism” against Mattu.

“The present mayor not only neglected the genuine aspirations of the people but also created an environment of mistrust, malpractices and polarisation,” Imran says in the letter.

The following day, those who moved the application against the mayor, an insider told NewsClick, are mostly independent coporators who have sided with PDP and BJP in the move. The independents are mostly affiliated with NC, PDP and PC.

BJP and Congress were the only two parties who officially fought in the municipal polls following which 53 independents were declared independents. Most of the independents later joined either NC, PDP or People’s Conference. PC has the highest member corporators at 22 while as Congress has 17, NC 11 and PDP only 5.

In a previous report, NewsClick had reported that with only four councilors the BJP at SMC are spearheading a rebellion to push for a no-confidence vote in the general council against its leadership. The SMC corridors since past month witnessed corporators alleging “horsetrading” and “blackmail”.

The 74-member body earlier in 2018 elected Mattu as its chief through an internal voting held after five year term elections. Mattu won after getting 40 corporators on his side defeating his opponent by 16 votes. Imran who got 36 votes won by a margin of one vote.