With voices rising from the Muslim community for the prestigious municipal corporation of Haldwani (MCH)’s mayoral position, any miscalculation on part of the Congress party in selection of the candidate, may upset its electoral equations to occupy the top seat of the Haldwani city mayor.
Former councillor of the erstwhile municipal council of Haldwani and member of the pradesh Congress committee Iqbal Bharti, has offered his candidature for the top job of the Haldwani city’s mayor urging the Congress party to seriously consider his request in this regard. I have served in the Congress party for the past four decades. The matter of fact is that during the past 40 years or so, the muslims have only been ignored here, he regretted.
The most important thing is that there are about 40,000 muslim voters out of 97,766 voters in the MCH as per the 2001 census . In the light of the sizeable representation of the muslim voters in the MCH, the Congress can’t ignore the aspirations of the huge number of muslims here, Bharti added.
He further maintained that these civic polls are being held as per the 2001 census in which there is a huge number of muslim voters. But as we believe, he added, according to the 2011 census, the percentage of the muslim voters would reasonably be less in comparison of voters of other sections of the society.
This is also a fact that all the future elections will be fought on the basis of the 2011 census. In this case the muslim voters won’t be in such a decisive position as they are today. So we urge the party leadership to understand the sentiments of the muslim community, Bharti added.
He further informed that a delegation of the representatives of the muslim community in his leadership has already met with them Chaudhary Birender Singh, party’s in charge of the Uttarakhand affairs, and Union Minister Harish Rawat in this connection.
Therefore, we have already cleared our position with the party leadership offering my candidature for the mayoral seat, Bharti further said. We made it clear to the party leadership that during the past so many years the Congress has only ignored the muslims here who could play a decisive role in these ongoing civil poll. That is why the party should grant ticket of the mayor seat to the muslim candidate .
In case the party ignores the aspiration of the muslim community, I will have no option but to fight the election of the mayoral seat independently, Bharti threatened.
The fact is that as the nomination process is still on. If the party doesn’t grant ticket for mayor seat to me or any other muslim candidate till April 12, the muslim community would call a ‘mahapanchayat’ and take a decision to chart its next course of action, Bharti threatened.