Following the controversy over the Mayor, Senior Deputy Mayor and Deputy Mayor elections of the Abohar Municipal Corporation, the administration has decided to hold the poll at the Deputy Commissioner’s office in Fazilka instead of Abohar on Tuesday.

The election will be conducted under the supervision of senior advocate Sandeep Goyal, who has been appointed as an observer by the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

In a letter addressed to all 50 newly elected municipal councillors, the Joint Commissioner, on behalf of the Commissioner, Municipal Corporation, Abohar, said the Commissioner, Ferozepur Division, had convened a meeting of the councillors at the Deputy Commissioner’s office in Fazilka on July 21 at 3 pm to elect the Mayor, Senior Deputy Mayor and Deputy Mayor.

The decision to shift the venue from Abohar to Fazilka has raised questions, with workers of various political parties saying the election should have been held in Abohar. A senior official, however, said Fazilka was chosen due to better infrastructure and security arrangements after the backlash in Abohar.

Abohar MLA Sandeep Jakhar told The Tribune that the BJP has the support of 28 councillors and that the change in venue would not affect the outcome.

The mayoral election was earlier deferred on July 9 after high political drama, with the BJP and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) trading allegations against each other.

AAP’s Abohar constituency in-charge Arun Narang had claimed that the party’s mayoral candidate, Ganesh Sablania, was elected after securing 27 votes in the 50-member House.

However, BJP leaders, led by former Punjab BJP president Sunil Jakhar and MLA Sandeep Jakhar, disputed the claim, maintaining that the BJP had a clear majority with 28 elected councillors. They alleged that no elections were held.

Then BJP workers gheraoed the official vehicle of Deputy Commissioner Amarpreet Kaur Sandhu and alleged that she and Commissioner, Ferozepur Division, Babita Kler, had failed to ensure a free and fair election to the civic body’s top posts.

The administration subsequently decided to defer the election.

Repeated attempts to contact Babita Kler for her response proved unsuccessful, as she neither answered phone calls nor responded to text messages.

Meanwhile, the election for the post of president of the Fazilka Municipal Council will also be held on Tuesday afternoon at the municipal council office. The election is being conducted following the intervention of the Punjab and Haryana High Court after the BJP approached the court seeking the conduct of the poll.

In the 25-member House, the BJP won 11 seats, the Congress secured nine, and the AAP bagged five. Later, one AAP councillor joined the BJP, taking its tally to 12. The local BJP leadership has claimed it has the required majority and asserted that it will elect its own president.