Delhi gets new Mayors amid AAP's claims of graft

New Delhi: The Municipal Corporation of Delhi elected new Mayors, Deputy Mayors and Standing Committee members on Wednesday. As expected, all three BJP nominees were elected unopposed — Mukesh Suryan as SDMC Mayor, Raja Iqbal Singh to North MCD and Shyam Sunder Aggarwal as East MCD Mayor. The ruling BJP holds an absolute majority in all three MCDs. Aam Aadmi Party Leaders of Opposition slammed the BJP, with MCD LOP Vikas Goel claiming that the BJP had appointed the "most corrupt councillors" as Mayors and standing committee chairpersons.

South Delhi's new Mayor, Suryan, a lifelong RSS worker, has previously headed the BJP Youth Wing and was also the education committee chairperson for North MCD, and Chairman of Najafgarh Ward Committee before being elected to his new post.

He said a priority was to make the SDMC "financially sustainable" by developing a better revenue generation plan amid the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown.

SDMC LoP Prem Chauhan (AAP) said that the new Mayor had been accused of corruption and the judiciary had expressed strong reservations against him earlier.

In 2018, Suryan was reprimanded by the Supreme Court for purportedly threatening MCD officials for carrying out sealing of unauthorised construction in Delhi.

In the North, Singh, GTB Nagar councillor, was earlier with the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) at the time of election, but switched over to the BJP when the SAD broke its alliance (NDA) with the BJP over the three new farm laws. Singh said his priority would be to "save Delhi from the third wave of COVID-19, sanitation, education and health".

In East MCD, Raghubarpura Councillor Shyam Sunder Aggerwal is the new Mayor, who said his focus would be on cleanliness and grievance redressal. Kiran Vaidh is the Deputy Mayor.

EDMC LOP Manoj Tyagi said that in the last one year the BJP ruled EDMC have done rampant corruption with garbage cleaning, CCTV installation in schools and hiring of security guards.