Chandigarh Mayor Polls: BJP Defeats AAP by 1 Vote. Here's Who Tilted the Scales

AAP had 14 votes in the house and the BJP had 15 —14 of the councillors and one ex officio vote from MP Kirron Kher.

BJP's Anup Gupta polled 15 votes to become the Mayor of Chandigarh.

(Photo: Twitter/Altered by The Quint)

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate Anup Gupta won the Chandigarh Mayor elections on Tuesday, 17 January, as he defeated Aam Aadmi Party's Jasbir Singh by just one vote.

A Mayor in Chandigarh is elected for a term of one year.

Previously the Deputy Mayor under Sarabjit Kaur, Anup Gupta was elected as a first time councillor from Ward 11 in the 2021 Municipal Corporation elections.

What's the final tally? A total of 29 votes were polled out of which 15 votes were polled for Gupta and 14 votes were polled to Singh. The AAP had 14 votes in the house and the BJP had 15 —14 votes of the councillors and one ex officio vote from the Member of Parliament.

What about the Congress and Shiromani Akali Dal? The Congress has six councillors in the Chandigarh Municipal Corporation and the SAD has one. Both of these parties abstained from voting, much like the last time.

Why are the Mayor polls important? Chandigarh is an important city as far as the political trend in Punjab is concerned. A Lok Sabha bellwether seat, it has elected an MP from the ruling party for the past four successive Lok Sabha elections. 

So, in 2021, when the AAP made inroads in the Municipal Corporation Polls by winning 14 seats leaving behind both the BJP and the Congress, their victory signified a change in Punjab's political landscape. The party then went on to win the 2022 Assembly elections in a landslide victory winning 92 out of the 117 Assembly constituencies.

Despite getting a majority in corporation elections, the AAP has not been able to win the Mayor elections for two consecutive terms, also making this a matter of prestige for Arvind Kejriwal's party.