AAP bags 14 seats as party makes big debut in Chandigarh MC polls

Arvind Kejriwal's Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) managed to surprise its opponents after bagging 14 seats in the Chandigarh municipal corporation elections on Monday as counting for votes was almost over for the election held here on Friday. Sitting mayor Ravi Kant Sharma of the BJP was defeated by AAP candidate Damanpreet Singh in the Chandigarh civic polls.

Chandigarh: The results of the Chandigarh Municipal elections have been declared, with the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) coming up in the first position, winning a total of 14 wards. The Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) and Congress have won respectively in 12 and eight wards. Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD), on the other hand, managed to grab only one ward for themselves.

This marked the first time for AAP to be contesting in the Chandigarh elections, while also being a first for BJP and SAD contesting the elections separately rather than in a junta.

The Chandigarh elections are being held across 35 wards, with a total of 203 candidates in the fray across all the seats, for whom the voting was conducted on December 24.

The counting process took place in a total of nine counting centres spread out across the city. Each centre conducted the counting for three to four three to four wards.

Chandigarh has approximately six lakh 30 thousand voters, and this election marked the highest voting percentages till date.

The municipal election saw a voting rate of more than 60 percent, outnumbering both 2011 (59.03 percent) and 2016 (59.54 percent) elections.

The highest polling percentage was recorded in ward four (73.78 percent).

The very first municipal elections back in 1996 saw a 45.77 percent polling rate.