Punjab cabinet likely to discuss schedule of polls to 129 urban local bodies on Wednesday

CHANDIGARH: The Punjab cabinet in its meeting scheduled for Wednesday is likely to deliberate about the schedule of elections to 129 urban local bodies (ULBs), including nine municipal corporations in the state.
Out of these urban local bodies, 126 are left with hardly two months to complete the six-month period after the end of their five-year term in March and April. As Abohar, Batala and Kapurthala were upgraded to municipal corporations in March last year and are yet to get elected bodies, their elections would also be held soon.
Punjab local bodies minister Brahm Mohindra told TOI, “I will take up this issue in the next cabinet meeting as we have to hold the elections anyhow before the six-month period ends in September-October.” He said that there was no constitutional provision to further delay the polls, even due to Covid-19 pandemic.
As the previous polls for these bodies were held in two phases in 2015, the term of some of these urban local bodies had come to an end in March and of a few in April. As per the Punjab Municipal Act, the state government has to hold the elections within six months period after their five-year term ends and till then it can appoint the IAS or PCS officers as administrators for the functioning of these bodies.
Mohindra reasoned that there was delay in holding these elections because the government had to provide 50% reservation to the women in urban local bodies like the state has already implemented this reservation in the panchayats and zila parishad elections. “Therefore, to implement this 50% reservation for women, there would be changes in municipal wards. There are more complexities in the poll procedure in cities which is not a case in villages,” he added. The state government would now have to complete all the election procedures speedily, he added.
There are a total of 167 urban local bodies in Punjab, including 13 municipal corporations. After coming to power, the Congress government had conducted elections to the three municipal corporations – Amritsar, Jalandhar and Patiala – along with 29 municipal councils and nagar panchayats in December 2017. Elections to the Ludhiana Municipal Corporation were held in February 2018. The Congress had swept all the four municipal corporations in these polls.
Before the Congress goes to the 2022 assembly polls, these urban local bodies elections are crucial for it since all the six municipal corporations awaiting polls — Bathinda, Mohali, Moga, Phagwara, Hoshiarpur and Pathankot — have mayors holding allegiance either to SAD or BJP. The SAD-BJP alliance was in power in Punjab during the 2015 municipal bodies’ polls.