PUNE, February 5: Suresh Kalmadi's Pune Vikas Aghadi today sustained a major blow as all its four corporators lost their memberships of the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) standing committee during a draw held to facilitate the process of retirement by rotation.Every year, eight out of the 16 committee members retire by rotation. However, this being the first year of the PMC body elected in February 1997, the draw was necessitated to facilitate the retirement by rotation process during the next four years.
The chits bearing names of all four members of the Aghadi, three of the four BJP members and one of the three Shiv Sena members, were handpicked during the draw conducted today at a special standing committee meeting this morning. Interestingly, the draw claimed the heads of former Congressman Aba Bagul, who resigned as the committee chairman to join the Aghadi in January, and BJP's Satish Misal, elected last Saturday to replace Bagul.
These members, Bagul, Balaji Telkar, Dayaram Rajguru andRamakant Andekar (Aghadi), Misal, Bapu Kamble and Jyotsna Sardeshpande (BJP) and Swati Nimhan (Sena), would lose their membership on March 1. But some of these members still stand a chance of getting re-elected to the committee at the fresh elections to be held on February 20 for the eight vacant posts.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
