West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari. File.
| Photo Credit: ANI
West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari on Monday (June 15, 2026) visited the headquarters of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC), and announced that he would end the impasse at the State’s largest civic body by holding elections by December 2026.Following the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) victory in the West Bengal Assembly election, the mayor of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation, Firhad Hakim, who ran the TMC-administered board, resigned. On June 8, the West Bengal government appointed Kolkata Municipal Commissioner Smita Pandey as the KMC administrator.“There was an impasse in the Kolkata Municipal Corporation after the mayor’s resignation... since they (Trinamool councillors) could not form a new board, the government dissolved the board and appointed an administrator. By December, through elections, the civic body will be handed over to elected representatives,” the CM said, addressing a gathering at the municipal corporation headquarters. Mr. Adhikari also spoke of plans for the delimitation of the civic body’s wards since voters were not evenly distributed across the wards.The previous polls to the KMC were held in December 2021, months after the 2021 Assembly election. The then ruling party of the State, the TMC, had formed the municipal board by winning 137 of 144 wards.Chief Minister’s visit to the KMC headquarters was largely welcomed not only by the former councillors of the BJP but also by former councillors of the Trinamool, who gathered in large numbers to greet Mr. Adhikari.Former KMC mayor Mr. Hakim, former KMC chairperson and South Kolkata MP Ms. Roy, and Ms. Mamata Banerjee’s sister-in-law Kajari Banerjee, were among the former councillors present at the event. Besides Ms. Kajari Banerjee, former councillors Debasish Kumar, Ananya Banerjee, Jui Biswas, and Asim Bose also participated at the event. Many former councillors jostled to greet the Chief Minister.TMC councillors welcomed the Chief Minister’s visit to the KMC headquarters, and said that despite representing a different political party, they had been invited to the event.The event marked the launch of a five-day ‘Swachhata se Swagat’ (welcome with cleanliness) campaign from June 15 to June 20, organised in honour of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s upcoming visit to the city. The people of the city must welcome the Prime Minister with a cleanliness drive, Mr. Adhikari said.Mr. Modi is scheduled to participate in an event to mark International Day of Yoga in Kolkata on June 21. Published - June 15, 2026 05:50 pm IST
