The Pioneer 15.05.2013
Sanjeev Vijay Vargiya elected new RMC Dy Mayor
The Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) backed councillor of ward-10
Sanjeev Vijay Vargiya was elected as the Deputy Mayor of Ranchi
Municipal Corporation (RMC) in an election held on May 14.
The election turned out to be a test of strength of political parties
who threw weight behind their respective candidates. While Md Aslam was
backed by Congress, Pradeep Kumar was said to have the support of AJSU
party.
The city unit of the Congress has accepted the results with a pinch of
salt and termed the win as insignificant. “A deputy mayor is a symbolic
post with absolutely no power,” said city president of Congress,
Surendra Singh adding “we still have the numbers in the municipal
board.”
Although, Congress feels the post to be insignificant, for BJP the win
will help in strengthening party’s base at the grass-root level. “A
Deputy Mayor plays an important role in the development of the city and
if works well the party will surely get benefit of that,” said Gama
Singh, BJP office bearer.While the new Deputy Mayor Vargiya got 24
votes, Aslam got 16 and Pradeep Kumar bagged only 14 votes.As many as 55
ward councillors of RMC took part in the voting which took place at the
Collectorate however, vote of one councillor was rejected for not
specifying the choice of the nominee.
Additional District Magistrate (Law & Order), Dhramendra Pandey presided over the election.
The newly elected DyM was administered oath of office by Divisional
Commissioner of Ranchi Vandana Dadel in the presence of acting
Administrator of RMC, Dipankar Panda who is also CEO (Chief Executive
Officer) of RMC.
Incidentally, the State Government had proposed the Divisional
Commissioner as the oath administering authority in the absence of
Mayor.
The post of mayor is lying vacant as the mayoral election was rescinded
by Governor Syed Ahmad and no fresh date for the election has been
announced by the State Election Commission.
Earlier on the day, the newly elected ward councillors reached at the
Collectorate alongwith their supporters and relatives for taking oath of
the office. The oath taking ceremony lasted for around an hour.
Meanwhile, several aspirants pulled back from race due to lack of
support and voted the DyM candidates instead. “I tried but could not
manage enough supporters so I decided not to file nomination,” said Arun
Jha, who a day before election had expressed his intention to contest
elections.
Elated with his win Vargiya said, “Ranchi is facing is a lot of problem
like shortage of drinking water, frequent power cuts, congested roads
and many more and it is time to think how we can deal with the problem
to make our city better.”
Vijay Vargiya, a businessman by profession, is known for working in the interest of the electorates of ward-10.
