Petitioners are seeking cancellation of the election and conducting polls again.
Chandigarh Mayor Elections 2024, Row Over Manoj Sonkar's Victory: A day after the BJP's Manoj Sonkar was declared Chandigarh Mayor, a hearing was held in the Punjab and Haryana High Court on Wednesday related to the Chandigarh Mayor elections 2024. However, the High Court has not put a stay on the Chandigarh mayor elections 2024 and called for its complete report within 3 weeks.
Earlier, the demand of the petitioners for an early hearing in this case was also not fulfilled. Apart from this, the petitioners were asking to seize the records as well. To this, the administration stated that the records had already been sealed and kept in the strong room.
Earlier on Tuesday, Chandigarh Mayor elections 2024 were held where BJP councilor Manoj Sonkar was elected mayor who defeated AAP-Congress Alliance candidate Kuldeep Tita by 4 votes. Notably, the BJP had only 15 votes including MPs and councillors with one vote from Shiromani Akali Dal. On the other hand, the Congress party and AAP together had 20 votes. However, the Presiding Officer Anil Masih declared 8 votes as invalid.
In protest against this, a petition was filed on behalf of AAP-Congress Alliance Mayor candidate Kuldeep Tita in which he accused the Presiding Officer Anil Masih of fraud.
The petition has alleged that the mayor's election was not conducted in a free and fair manner and that the rules were violated during the counting of votes. Therefore, they are seeking the cancellation of the election and conducting polls again.
It has been alleged that Anil Masih while addressing the House in a very strange manner, counted the votes himself while no agent of both the candidates was called for the counting of votes.