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AAP, BJP to battle it out in Chandigarh mayoral polls as Congress steps out of race
AAP fields Jasbir Singh Laddi, while BJP banks on incumbent Chandigarh deputy mayor Anup Gupta for the January 17 contest
The contest for the next Chandigarh mayor on January 17 is set to be between the Aam Aadmi Party and the Bharatiya Janata Party, with the Congress once again opting out of the race.
In a repeat from last year, the Congress chose not to field any candidate in the mayoral polls as the deadline for filing nominations got over on Thursday.
The BJP declared incumbent deputy mayor Anup Gupta as its candidate for the post of mayor, while Kanwarjeet Rana and Harjeet Singh have been fielded for the posts of senior deputy mayor and deputy mayor, respectively.
From AAP, Jasbir Singh Laddi will fight it out against Gupta for the mayor’s chair. For the posts of senior deputy mayor and deputy mayor, the party is relying on female candidates Taruna Mehta and Suman Devi, respectively.
The six candidates filed their nominations at the municipal corporation (MC) office in Sector 17.
The BJP candidates were accompanied by MP Kirron Kher, Chandigarh BJP president Arun Sood and senior party leader Sanjay Tandon, while the AAP candidates came with Mohali MLA and co-in-charge of Chandigarh unit Kulwant Singh, AAP’s Punjab and Chandigarh co-in-charge Jarnail Singh, Chandigarh AAP president Prem Garg and co-in-charge Pardeep Chhabra.
Sood said the BJP will win the elections with a clear majority, while Garg said all posts will go to AAP this time and the party will complete all pending projects in the city.
BJP has an edge
In the 35-member MC House, both the AAP and the BJP have 14 members each, while six councillors are from the Congress and one from the SAD. But with another vote of member of Parliament and ex-officio member Kirron Kher, BJP has an edge in the elections.To be elected as the mayor, a candidate must secure at least 19 votes.
In case, both the Congress and SAD abstain from voting, 15 votes will be required for a win.
While the AAP was hinting at a tie-up with Congress to beat the BJP, Congress’ Chandigarh president HS Lucky said the higher ups in Delhi refused, following which the party decided not to contest the elections at all. However, a call on whether to abstain from voting was yet to be taken.
Elections for the posts of Chandigarh mayor, senior deputy mayor and deputy mayor are held every year during the five-year term of the MC House. In the first term in 2022, the BJP had clinched all three posts.
The first and fourth terms are reserved for a woman candidate from the general category, and the third for a candidate from the Scheduled Caste category. The second and fifth terms are open to any candidate from the general category.
In the MC elections held in December 2021, the AAP, contesting its first MC poll in the city, had come out on the top by clinching 14 seats. BJP had emerged as the second-largest party in the House with 12 councillors, while the Congress had won eight seats and SAD one.
However, following the elections, in January, Congress councillor Harpreet Kaur Babla, along with her husband, Devinder Singh Babla, a former Congress councillor, had switched to the BJP, increasing its strength in the House to 13 and equalising the number of votes between AAP and BJP with additional vote of MP Kher.
In the mayoral elections held subsequently in January 2022, both the BJP and the AAP contested with 14 votes each, but BJP’s Sarbjit Kaur won after defeating AAP’s Anju Katyal by one vote, as AAP’s one vote was declared invalid.
Six months later, in June, another Congress councillor, Gurcharan Jeet Singh Kala, also moved to the BJP, bumping up the party’s share in the House to 14, equal to the number of AAP councillors.
