Election-fatigued Punjab to have panchayat samiti and zila parishad polls now
Punjab has virtually been in election mode since March 16, 2024, when the code of conduct came into effect for the Lok Sabha elections.
The zila parishad and panchayat samiti polls have been long overdue, with the last elections to these bodies held in September 2018. (Express File) Punjab, which saw five sets of elections and had the model code of conduct in place for at least five months last year, is facing another round of polls, this time to zila parishads and panchayat samitis, which must be held before May 31, as per a notification issued on Thursday.
The zila parishad and panchayat samiti polls have been long overdue, with the last elections to these bodies held in September 2018. The government is planning to hold them before May, as the state gets busy with the harvesting of wheat and its procurement in April.
The notification was issued by Dilraj Singh Sandhawalia, Secretary, Department of Rural Development and Panchayats.
Leaders of the ruling AAP, including Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, returned to Chandigarh only a week ago after campaigning for Delhi Assembly polls for over a month.
On Thursday, Mann held a cabinet meeting after over four months due to the different sets of elections. The meeting, which addressed over 70 agenda items, lasted for more than five hours.
The state is awaiting two Assembly bypolls as well in 2025. Last month, AAP MLA for Ludhiana (West) Gurpreet Singh Gogi died from a gunshot wound under mysterious circumstances. A bypoll must be conducted to fill the vacant seat within six months, before mid-July.
The second bypoll is to be held in Banga if the Assembly Speaker accepts the resignation of Sukhwinder Kumar Sukhi, the Shiromani Akali Dal MLA whom the AAP poached in August last year. After the Speaker refused to accept his resignation, the matter reached the Punjab and Haryana High Court, which has directed the Speaker to hear the plaintiff.
The state has virtually been in election mode since March 16, 2024, when the code of conduct came into effect for the Lok Sabha elections, which were held in Punjab in its last leg, on June 1. Ten days later, on June 10, a bypoll for the Jalandhar (West) seat was announced, with the poll code taking effect in Jalandhar district until July 10, when the constituency voted.
In September 2024, panchayat elections were announced and the code of conduct came into effect in over 13,000 villages across the state, leading to heightened political activity. And the state’s political leadership, except for SAD leaders, also remained busy campaigning in neighbouring Haryana for the October 5 Assembly elections there.
When the state finally voted in the panchayat elections on October 15, 2024, the Election Commission announced bypolls in four Assembly segments—Gidderbaha, Barnala, Chabbewa and Dera Baba Nanak. These elections took place on November 20, leading to another surge in political activity.
Subsequently, the panchayat elections and municipal elections were held in December 2024.
Amid the elections, the government was able to hold only five cabinet meetings in 2024—on March 9, August 14, August 29, September 5 and October 5. In January this year, the government could not hold any cabinet meetings. It had planned an Assembly session for the first week of January to reject the Centre’s draft agriculture marketing policy, but this was not held because of the Delhi elections.
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