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Chandigarh Vikas Manch gets boost

Special Correspondent

29 office-bearers of Block Congress Committee join the Manch

CHANDIGARH: Chandigarh Vikas Manch of former Union Minister Harmohan Dhawan, which is contesting the ensuing Chandigarh Municipal Corporation elections in alliance with the BJP and the Akali Dal, received a boost on Saturday with the president and all 29 office-bearers of the Bapu Dham Colony Block Congress Committee joining the Manch.

Announcing this at a press conference here, Mr. Dhawan said that Harjinder Singh, president of Block No.19 of the Nationalist Congress Party, had also joined the Manch.

Mr. Dhawan asserted that the Akali Dal-BJP-CVM alliance was committed to defeating and ousting the Congress from the civic body as it had been exposed before the public. The alliance would highlight "hollowness" of the so-called "development plank" of the Congress which had failed to deliver the goods.

He also accused the Congress and Union Minister of State for Finance Pawan Kumar Bansal of not implementing the electoral promises made in the election manifestos of 1996 and 2001. Rather the Congress had imposed taxes like property tax and parking fees on the public. Moreover, the promise that "need-based violations" would be compounded and regularised had been ignored.

Denying any rift with the BJP on seat sharing, Mr. Dhawan asserted that the issue would be resolved amicably after the 77 applications from the 26 wards received by the Manch were screened and short-listed in a day or two. The major focus was not on egoistic claim to a particular seat but to ensure that winning candidates were selected irrespective of the party to which they belonged.

The Chandigarh Vikas Manch, a non-political forum, had won three seats out of 20 in the 2001 civic elections. Later, one of its councillors had joined the Congress. It was only last month that the Chandigarh Administration enhanced the number of wards to 26.

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