In a major development, the Punjab Government on Friday canceled the membership of Mohali Mayor Amarjeet Singh Sidhu — younger brother of former Health Minister and former Mohali MLA Balbir Singh Sidhu. Both the brothers had joined the BJP after Congress’ loss in the 2022 elections in June.
The decision by the state Local Bodies Department came in the wake of an inquiry against Amarjeet Sidhu into an alleged conflict of interest case. Now, Amarjeet Sidhu has to step down from the Mohali mayoral post.
Currently, Amarjeet Sidhu is in the US. He went abroad after appearing before the Local Bodies Minister Dr Inderbir Singh Nijjar.
He was elected mayor of the Mohali Municipal Corporation the previous year.
Mohali Corporation councilors had lodged a complaint with the Principal Secretary (Local Bodies Department) on August 10 alleging that Amarjeet Sidhu had favoured a housing society — the Amritpreet Cooperative Society Limited — by awarding tenders worth lakhs for carrying out development works. The councillors in their complaint had alleged that Mayor Amarjeet Sidhu was a member of the Society’s governing body.
They alleged that the Mayor is the chairman of the Finance and Contracts Committee (F&CC) of the civic body, and “by awarding the contracts to the society, the Mayor had violated the Municipal Corporation Act’s Section 63”. The councilors demanded that Sidhu’s councillorship should also be canceled.
It was alleged that as a mayor, he awarded orders of development works worth around Rs 1.45 crore to the Society.
The Department had issued a show-cause notice to Amarjeet Sidhu in September. In his reply sent on October 14, he described the complaint against him as “politically motivated” and sought a personal hearing. Following this, he was asked to appear before the Minister.
During his appearance before the Minister, Amarjeet Sidhu had denied the allegations and termed the allegations ‘politically motivated’. It has been learnt that he could not give any satisfactory answer to the Government over his alleged role in awarding development works to Amritpreet Cooperative Society Limited.
