The Congress on Tuesday swept the Ludhiana civic body polls by winning 62 out of 95 wards with the BJP-Akali combine being reduced to just 21 seats. Lok Insaf Party and AAP alliance could not even reach the double digit mark.
AAP got just one seat while its ally, LIP led by Bains brothers, could bag just seven wards.
Meanwhile, a delegation led by the Akali-BJP alliance on Tuesday met Governor VP Singh Badnore asking him to instruct the state’s Congress government to annul the outcome of the Ludhiana polls. Led by Bikram Singh Majithia, Maheshinder Singh Grewal, Dinesh Kumar and Rajinder Bhandari, the delegation alleged that the Congress had indulged in booth capturing and rigging the votes adding that the ruling party had murdered the democracy.
For the Congress, the victory comes amidst the revelation that Chief Minister’s son-in-law was allegedly involved in the banking fraud. The CBI on Sunday had registered a case of fraud, amounting to Rs 200 crore, against Simbhaoli Sugars Ltd, one of India’s largest sugar mills. The chief minister’s son-in-law, Gurpal Singh, worked at the sugar mills as a senior executive. The Hapur-based sugar mill is accused of having fraudulently diverted funds received as loans for sugarcane farmers and self help groups in 2011, reported India Today.
Today’s results ALSO show that the Congress has maintained its lead that the party secured in the last year’s assembly elections. The party had swept the assembly elections in Ludhiana, the industrial hub of Punjab, in February last year.