28122021-CT-01.qxd 12/28/2021 1:17 AM Page 1 c m y b Chandigarh TRIBUNE TUESDAY | 28 DECEMBER 2021 | CHANDIGARH PAGE 2 P'KULA PEOPLE RUSH TO GET VACCINE AS DEADLINE NEARS People in Panchkula district turn up at vaccination centres in large numbers to get the Covid vaccine. FORECAST PARTLY CLOUDY TRICITY COVID REPORT CHD SAMPLES TESTED POSITIVE RECOVERED NEW CASES ACTIVE CHANGE DEATHS NEW 5,06,598 30,944 30,512 2 51 2 381 0 CHANDIGARH 3 0 134 MOHALI 156 SEVERE VERY POOR POOR MODERATE SATISFACTORY GOOD INBRIEF EX-MOHALI MAYOR JOINS AAP Mohali: Former Mayor of Mohali Kulwant Singh on Monday joined AAP. As sitting Congress MLA Balbir Singh Sidhu and Kulwant are ready to contest against each other, there is bound to be an interesting contest in this Assembly constituency. In the last MC elections, the Congress, led by Sidhu, had defeated the Azad Group-led by Kulwant. TNS Who will don Mayor’s cap T O get its candidate elected as the Mayor, any political party needs a simple majority of 19 votes. There are 35 votes of councillors and one of ex-officio member, i.e. local MP (BJP’s Kirron Kher). Technically, the BJP has 13 seats, one less than AAP in the House. However, the catch is that since it is a secret voting in House, any party may have its own candidate as the First Citizen by dint of cross-voting, which has been seen on many occasions in the past. The city Mayor has one-year term and the first term is reserved for a woman councillor. — TNS Missing star campaigners: Did BJP sense defeat? I T seems some BJP leaders had sensed defeat long before. Perhaps this is the reason, its listed star campaigners, Home Minister Amit Shah and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, did not turn up in the city though the party claimed they had their engagements. AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal and Delhi Deputy CM Manish Sisodia among other Delhi MLAs made their presence felt in the city. Kejriwal had addressed a rally in Sector 43. — TNS SUNRISE WEDNESDAY 7:18 AM TWITTER/THETRIBUNECHD AAP SAD OTHERS 12 27.08% 2.78% 2.6% 7.10% AAP BJP 1 CONG SAD 60.7%OF 1.34% 8 FACEBOOK/CHANDIGARHTRIBUNE IND NOTA 6,33,475 LAKH BJP CONG 29.30% 29.79% VOTERS VOTED FOR 203 CANDIDATES “People are done with the BJP as well as the Congress. They wanted a third alternative and found it in Arvind Kejriwal. “We have 13 votes (with MP’s vote). Councillors should support our mayoral candidate as we can give a stable govt. “If AAP is able to have its Mayor, it will never be in a position to fulfil its promises of freebies, as the Admn will not support it. — PREM GARG, AAP CITY CHIEF — ARUN SOOD, BJP PRESIDENT — S CHAWLA, CONG CHIEF In hung MC House, BJP reduced to 12 seats, Cong doubles its tally with 8 seats, SAD retains lone seat MC POLL RESULTS Sandeep Rana Tribune News Service Chandigarh, December 27 The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) emerged as the single largest party in its MC poll debut by winning 14 seats even as the results threw up a hung House. The ruling BJP could win only 12 seats and the Congress remained on third position with eight seats. The SAD retained its single sitting councillor’s seat while its alliance partner BSP drew a blank. Though the Congress remained at the third spot, it got the highest vote percentage. The grand old party polled 1,14,942 votes (29.79% vote share). While the ruling party had the second highest share in voting (1,13,045 votes with 29.30% vote share), AAP which , topped the seat tally, had the lowest voting share among the top three parties. It got 1,04,471 votes with 27.08% vote share. Also, Ward No. 10 Congress candidate Harpreet Kaur Babla, wife of Leader of the Opposition Devinder Singh Babla, won from the woman-reserved seat with the highest margin of 3,103 votes, defeating Rashi Bhasin of the ruling party. Another Congress candidate from Ward Number 34, Gurpeet Singh, won with the lowest margin of nine votes. He got the better of BJP’s Bhupinder Sharma. Similarly, Senior Deputy Mayor and BJP candidate from Ward Number 2 Maheshinder Singh Sidhu could save his seat by the second lowest margin of 11 votes, beating his arch-rival Harmohinder Singh Lucky of the Congress. Mayor Ravi Kant Sharma, two former BJP mayors Davesh Moudgil and Rajesh Kalia, the son of the city Congress chief and the AAP’s election campaign committee chairman were among the prominent losers. The wives of some sitting councillors also tasted defeat. The richest candidate in the fray, BJP’s Anup Gupta, defeated Omkar Singh Aulakh by 167 votes from Ward Number 11. Gupta, along with his wife, had declared assets worth ~45 crore in his nomination papers. Poll different on several counts T AAP candidate Daman Preet Singh has defeated Mayor Ravi Kant of the BJP (below) from Ward 17 KEY LOSERS AAP supporters dance outside a counting centre in Sector 11, Chandigarh, on Monday. TRIBUNE PHOTO: PRADEEP TEWARI SEE ALSO PAGE 3 issue. While the BJP contested 35 seats, its former ally fought in alliance with the BSP AAP also contested for . the first time here. Besides, several rebels contested as Independents. In view of multi-cornered fronts, poll pundits failed to guess that AAP was going to make it big in the poll. Many had predicted only three to five seats for AAP — TNS . Ravi Kant Sharma (BJP) WARD NO. 17 Davesh Moudgil (BJP) WARD NO. 21 Rajesh Kalia (BJP) WARD NO. 26 Sumit Chawla (Congress) WARD NO. 14 Chander Mukhi Sharma (AAP) WARD NO. 13 Political bigwigs bite dust Sandeep Rana Tribune News Service HIGHEST WINNING MARGINS WARD NUMBER 10: Harpreet Kaur Babla (Congress) defeats Rashi Bhasin (BJP) by 3,103 VOTES CLOSE CONTESTS WARD NUMBER 27: Gurbax Rawat (Congress) beats Ravinder Singh Rawat (BJP) by 2,862 VOTES WARD NUMBER 34: Gurpeet Singh (Congress) beats Bhupinder Sharma by NINE VOTES WARD NUMBER 2: Maheshinder Singh Sidhu (BJP) defeats Harmohinder Singh Lucky (Congress) by 11 VOTES Periphery areas script spectacular AAP victory Amit Sharma Tribune News Service Chandigarh, December 27 Periphery areas, including 13 villages which were merged with the Municipal Corporation (MC), contributed to AAP’s victory in its MC poll debut in a big way. In Ward No. 1, comprising Kaimbwala, Khuda Ali Sher, Khuda Jassu and Khuda Lahora villages, and Khuda Lahora Colony, neighbouring Mohali district, the AAP candidate won with a margin of 1,009 votes. The areas that fall under Ward No. 4, 15, 19, 21, 26, 29 and 31, which mainly include periphery areas of the city, also voted for AAP The party candidates . won with a huge margin in a majority of these wards. In Ward No. 21 that includes Sector 47, Bair Majra, Faidan Burail and Chahar Taraf Burail, was won by AAP candidate with a margin of 939 votes defeating a BJP candidate. The margin of AAP candidate’s win in Ward No. 26, comprising Dadu Majra colony, Dadu Majra village, Shahpur colony and village, and rehabilitation colony, Sector 38 (West), was of 1,440 votes. Ward No. 29, which includes several colonies of Sectors 55 and 56 situated close Mohali border, also put their trust in the AAP candidate who won with a margin of 2,738 votes. Similarly, the AAP candidate registered a big win with a margin of 1,062 votes from Ward No. 31 which includes colonies of Sectors 52 and 63 situated on the periphery. Even the Bhaskar colony of Sector 25 and Sector 25 (West), that fall under Ward No. 16, voted for the AAP can- didate. The AAP candidates also comfortable won in many wards comprising sector areas. In Ward No. 17, comprising Sectors 22 and 23; Ward No. 18, including Sector 20 and 30; Ward No. 22, which includes Sectors 31, 32 and 33; Ward No. 23, including Sectors 34, 35 and 43; and Ward No. 25, which has Sectors 37 and 38, the AAP candidates registered win. 29 of 35 municipal councillors are new faces PHOTOS: MANOJ MAHAJAN/PRADEEP TEWARI/NITIN MITTAL/VICKY FILE PHOTO HIS year’s MC poll was different from all previous ones for many reasons. The 13 villages, which were earlier under the UT Administration, were merged with the MC. Their residents were the new voters and it seemed many leaders had no idea about their voting behaviour and aspirations. The number of wards was increased from 26 to 35. Owing to an increase in the number of seats, ward delimitation was carried out which affected the political calculations of the sitting councillors. This time, the old partners, the SAD and the BJP parted , their ways over the farm laws A 23-year-old youth from Rally village in Sector 12-A allegedly attacked by a group of 12 men at Yavnika Park. AAP’s 14-seat debut win stuns big parties 134 PANCHKULA 14 PAGE 3 VOTE SHARE BSP | SP | LEFT | INDEPENDENTS: 0 9 6 SUNSET TUESDAY 5:31 PM SEAT TALLY 12 AIR QUALITY INDEX 401-500 301-400 201-300 101-200 51-100 0-50 MAX 22°C | MIN 6°C | YESTERDAY MAX 22°C | MIN 6°C 15 7,01,720 69,106 67,976 6 56 1 1,074 0 YOUTH, FRIEND INJURED IN ATTACK BY A GROUP OF 12 MEN RoundGlass Punjab FC start their I-League campaign by registering a 2-0 win over Rajasthan United FC. P’KULA MOHALI 8,62,483 65,781 64,600 7 103 2 1,078 0 PAGE 2 ROUNDGLASS PUNJAB FC LOG VICTORY IN OPENING MATCH Chandigarh, December 27 The MC House will have as many as 29 new faces out of the total 35 councillors. All 14 candidates from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) are first-time councillors. Four of them had left the Congress before the elections. The youngest councillor, Neha (26), is also from AAP. The Congress also has only three sitting or ex-councillors — Gurbax Rawat, Harpreet Kaur Babla and Gurcharanjit Singh Kala. Its other five councillors are new faces. In the BJP four are old and , continued on page 2 Chandigarh, December 27 Bigwigs from the ruling BJP , including the sitting and two former mayors, city Congress chief’s son and the AAP election committee chairman had to bite dust in the Municipal Corporation (MC) elections. Mayor Ravi Kant Sharma, along with Davesh Moudgil and Rajesh Kalia, who were mayors in the current MC term, lost to the AAP candidates. Sharma, who secured 2,889 votes, lost to Daman Preet Singh, who polled 3,717 votes, from Ward No. 17. Moudgil was defeated by Jasbir Singh from Ward No. 21. While Jasbir polled 3,016 votes, Moudgil managed to secure 2,077 votes. Kalia got the third place in Ward No. 26. AAP candidate Kuldeep Kumar polled 5,824 votes and Jatinder Kumar of the Congress bagged 4,384 votes while Kalia got 3,193 votes. City Congress president Subhash Chawla’s son Sumit Chawla, who was contesting from Ward No 14, had to taste defeat too. BJP candidate Kuljeet Singh Sandhu won from the ward with 3,198 votes while Kuldeep Singh of AAP got 2,943 votes and Chawla 2,532 votes. AAP leader Chander Mukhi Sharma, who is the party’s election committee continued on page 2 COUNCILLORS’ KIN TASTE DEFEAT NEHA (26, YOUNGEST COUNCILLOR) AAP WARD NUMBER 19 c m y b SACHIN GALLAV (27) CONGRESS WARD NUMBER 13 ANUP GUPTA BJP WARD NUMBER 11 Sitting BJP councillor Jagtar Singh Dhillon’s wife Saravjit Kaur Dhillon lost from Ward No. 6. Former councillor and city Congress vicepresident Bhupinder Singh Badheri’s son Atinder Singh Robby too tasted defeat from Ward No. 3