{The swearing-in ceremony ended amid chaos}
{The entire staff of the Urban Development Department remained absent, other ministers were present ,
zahid ali
Lucknow, 26 March. The swearing-in ceremony of the newly elected councilors and mayor of Lucknow Municipal Corporation in the VVIP auditorium of the state capital, and neither Uttar Pradesh’s Urban Development Minister AK Sharma nor Principal Secretary of Urban Development Department Amrit Abhijat nor Local Municipal Corporation Director Neha were seen on the occasion. Sharma appeared on the stage. Dr. Roshan Jacob, the hardworking Divisional Commissioner of Lucknow, performed the formalities of administering the oath of the Constitution to the new Mayor Sushma Kharwal, while the newly elected Mahamour administered the oath to the new councilors standing in front of the mike on the decorated stage of Indira Gandhi Pratishthan and addressed the people of Lucknow. All the honorable councilors elected by votes were seen standing below the stage and taking oath. The reason was that the whole stage was full of big and small leaders of BJP and once sitting on the chair, who gets up today. So it was the compulsion of the councilors or due to the understanding of the organizers of the swearing-in ceremony, it was not considered necessary to give stage to the same councilors for whom VVIP passes were distributed throughout the city. However, the swearing-in ceremony went off somehow. Queues of all guests and dignitaries were present on the stage. In which Deputy Chief Minister Brajesh Pathak, former Urban Development Minister Ashutosh Tandon, former Deputy Chief Minister Dr. Dinesh Sharma, Finance Minister Suresh Khanna, MLA Dr. Neeraj Bora, Mahendra Singh were present as chief guests. Apart from District Magistrate Suryapal Gangwar, Municipal Commissioner Indrajit Singh, Additional Municipal Commissioner Pankaj Singh and Abhay Kumar Pandey, the presence of former Mayor Sanyukta Bhatia was important. Deputy Chief Minister Brajesh Pathak gave a long speech enumerating the achievements of the state government. In which the message of compliance of duties to the newly elected councilors was also included. Former Mayor Samyukta Bhatia congratulated the new successor Sushma Kharkwal and Municipal Commissioner Indrajit Singh presented mace symbolizing strength. Overall, the whole event looked like a program of mockery of the prestige of Indian culture and Lucknowi culture. Such was the chaos that in the Jupiter Hall of Indira Gandhi Pratishthan, all the BJP office bearers, along with former leaders, all the media persons were also forced to stand during the entire program.
Newly elected Mayor Sushma Kharkwal said in her speech after taking oath that we express our gratitude to the people of Lucknow for providing us the opportunity to serve. For the last 32 years, the people of Lucknow have faith in the BJP. There was a time when Lucknow and Atal ji complemented each other. The sapling that Atal ji had planted in the form of Lucknow is standing as a huge tree today. He said that Lucknow will be made one of the best cities in the country. After taking the oath, we will plant trees together and we will also take a pledge towards cleanliness. He said that with four pledges, we and all our fellow councilors will work to make Lucknow beautiful.
At the same time, Finance Minister Suresh Khanna in the state government said in his address that when an outsider comes to Lucknow, he wants to see Lucknow as a model city. Lucknow is a city with a permanent population of 3.5 million and daily about 5 million people come and go from outside.
No mayor has ever won by 2 lakh votes in the whole of India, but Sushma Kharwal has won. All councilors, municipal corporations and city dwellers should contribute to the cleanliness drive. Municipal elections were just a trailer, the real election is the 2024 Lok Sabha. In one year, the Municipal Corporation and the new councilors should do such work which will set an example. There are traffic jams at many places in Lucknow, the public has to be freed from the jam.
Newly elected councilors did not get chair in swearingIffamullah ‘Faiz’, the councilor of Kalbe Abid Ward, who got elected from the Congress ticket amidst the crowd’s strong push, said that we have won for the fourth time and we have only the swearing-in ceremony, but you see that such a big situation is only for us. There is no arrangement to sit in it. On the other hand, SP councilor Nadeem Khan, who won the Kadam Rasool ward, was also seen staring here and there waiting for the chair, on being asked he said that it is a strange mismanagement. There is no chair for us only, the rest of the hall is full. It is not that only the councilors of the opposition parties were worried about not getting the chair, but dozens of BJP councilors were also seen getting heckled by the crowd during the entire event. However, shortly before the swearing-in ceremony was over, the organizers captured all the seats and sent the sitting BJP workers out of the auditorium after persuading them to go and then the councilors who had waited for hours got a place to sit.}