With the three BJP-led municipal corporations facing corruption charges from the opposition, South Delhi's newly-elected Mayor Subhash Arya has set his top priorities -- to maintain independence of SDMC and keep the civic body corruption free.
"The years to come ahead will be a challenge for us. We will work towards maintaining transparency. Our previous two mayors have also worked hard, and we will take their work forward.
"Out top priorities would be independence of the corporation, maintaining transparency and keeping corruption away, e-governance, sanitation and education and parks," he said.
The 71-year-old BJP leader posted his victory at the mayoral polls by defeating Congress' senior leader Farhad Suri, a former Mayor, with a margin of 19 votes, as BJP repeated its municipal triumph in the high-stake elections on Friday.
His election as South Delhi Mayor also marks his eventful journey from a humble Jana Sangh worker to one of the top municipal posts in the city, where he first came to, as a four-year-old partition refugee from Pakistan.
Born in 1943 in Jhelum in Pakistan, Arya, currently a veteran BJP leader in South Delhi Municipal Corporation, saw through vicissitudes of fortune and political turmoils, in the last nearly seven decades, an experience, that he says has held him in good stead.
"I came to Delhi along with my family after leaving Pakistan in 1947. We first settled in Fazilka in Punjab. And, in December 1947, we moved to old Delhi's Darya Ganj... My father was RSS Jhelum sanghchalak. And, after leaving everything behind in Pakistan, our struggle began in India," Arya told PTI.
A four-term councillor from Rajouri Garden, he began his journey into politics as a young boy, when in 1958, he became a member of the Jana Sangh.
Arya was elected as a Metropolitan Councillor in 1983, a post then similar to an MlA, which he served till 1990.
In 1997, he fought the municipal polls from Rajouri Garden and won, the councillor seat, which he has kept since then for the last 18 years, despite changes in the municipal set up.
The BJP-led civic bodies have been facing corruption charges from Congress, the main opposition, and AAP too has alleged that the "corporations have become a den of corruption".
All five newly-elected AAP MlAs chose to give the mayoral polls a miss.
Arya's mayoral rival Suri, also the leader of Opposition had a few days before the election alleged "electoral malpractice" in the SDMC.
After winning the Mayor post, Arya, however, parried the blow and said the party has won the elections "on principles, with which it had contested it."
On the fund crisis in the three corporations, though SDMC has so far somehow managed to keep itself out of the red, Arya said, "we will approach the Centre and seek funds if Delhi government doesn't give us our legally-bound fund that we are to receive from it."
The erstwhile unified Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), was trifurcated into -- North, South and East municipal corporation in 2012 during the Sheila Dikshit government and since then the fund crisis in the civic bodies has compounded.
All three corporations since trifurcation, independently elect a Mayor and a Deputy Mayor each every year, for the respective area.
Reminiscing further his initial days of political journey, Arya said, he became the general secretary of the mandal of the local Sangh in 1967. While living in Darya Ganj, our family opened a hosiery business in Sadar Bazar for earning our livelihood, he said.
"My father died during the Emergency era in 1976. I used to organise meetings of senior leaders of the party during this time of tumultuous politics and I was even put in jail for few days, my house was sealed," he said.
The post of Mayor sees five single-year terms on a rotation basis, with the first year being reserved for women, the second for open category, third for reserved category, and the remaining two also being in open category.
The electorate for the mayoral polls are the elected members to the respective municipal Houses, nominated members from the MlAs in the Delhi Assembly and the area MPs.
This year it was open category, while last year it was for the reserved category.
Arya's election marks the third of the five-year mayoral term, the first and second being won by BJP's Sarita Chaudhary and Khushi Ram respectively.