BJP wins Chandigarh mayoral polls for fourth time, Saurabh Joshi elected mayor

CHANDIGARH: The BJP on Thursday retained the post of the Mayor of the Chandigarh Municipal Corporation, with its councillor Saurabh Joshi getting elected in a three-cornered contest by securing 18 votes in a House of 36. He is the last mayor as the corporation’s five-year tenure is ending in December.

BJP councillor Suman Sharma was elected as the Deputy Mayor, while the party’s Jasmanpreet Singh was elected as Senior Deputy Mayor, both receiving 18 votes each. The BJP succeeded in bagging the post for the fourth time. However, AAP’s Yogesh Dhingra got 11 votes, and Congress candidate Gurpreet Singh Gabbi received seven votes.

In the past, the INDIA bloc partners, the Congress party and AAP, were in the fray unitedly. This time, both parted ways and contested the mayoral elections separately. Both AAP and the Congress had joined hands in Chandigarh ahead of the 2024 mayoral polls. The alliance enabled both parties to wrest the mayoral and Lok Sabha seats in 2024, but they lost to the BJP in the 2025 mayoral poll.