Chandigarh: Taking an early lead in announcing candidates for the Municipal Corporation (MC) elections scheduled for December, the Chandigarh unit of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Friday released its first list of nine candidates for 35 municipal wards. The names were finalised at a high-level meeting led by Delhi MLA and Chandigarh AAP in-charge Jarnail Singh. Senior functionaries and office-bearers of the Chandigarh unit also attended the meeting.Sources said the names of candidates for the remaining 26 wards would be announced soon. The party is considering releasing them in two separate lists.By announcing its candidates early, AAP aims to give them sufficient time to reach out to voters, interact with residents and strengthen their campaign bases. Sitting councillors have been asked to approach people with their report cards and highlight the work done in their respective wards over the past five years.The nine candidates announced on Friday are Didar Singh, Gurpreet Kaur Laadi, Anju Katyal, Onkar Singh Aulakh, Kuldeep Kumar, Radhika Dhingra, Ajit Singh, Satnam Kaur and Arun Prabha Khurana. Interestingly, only Anju Katyal among the nine is a sitting municipal councillor. The remaining candidates are new faces, with several being spouses or relatives of sitting party councillors.AAP sources said the nine wards did not have significant dissidence or multiple contenders, making the selection process relatively straightforward. Most of the candidates have been associated with the party since its inception and have remained loyal to it. However, two candidates or their family members joined the party only a few months ago.Sources said ward-level surveys, loyalty and winnability were the key criteria considered while selecting the candidates. Loyalty, in particular, figured prominently during the series of meetings, they added.AAP had won 14 seats in the Dec 2021 MC elections, emerging as the single largest party in its maiden electoral outing in the civic body. However, eight of its councillors subsequently defected to other parties, while a Shiromani Akali Dal councillor later joined AAP. The party currently has seven councillors in the MC. Despite emerging as the single largest party in 2021, AAP managed to secure the mayor’s post only once, in 2024, with Congress’s support. The BJP elected the mayor in the other four years.AAP Chandigarh in-charge Jarnail Singh congratulated the candidates and expressed confidence that the party would win at least 30 seats and form its own mayor-led administration. He said people wanted change and the party was prepared to meet their expectations.AAP Chandigarh president Vijay Pal Singh said the party would contest the elections with full strength and unity. He said its aim was to provide better civic amenities, transparent administration and people-centric governance.
