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The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Friday coasted to victory in the Punjab civic body elections, winning 958, or 48% of 1,977 wards. Hailing the win, Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann said people had “defeated the politics of hatred and supported developmental politics”.

The Congress finished second with 397 wards and the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) fourth with 192, behind Independents at 251. The BJP came a distant fifth, but the party managed to increase its tally from 49 to 172, increasing its footprint across Punjab’s urban and semi-urban landscape. The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) won seven wards.

Out of eight municipal corporations, the AAP won five: Barnala, Batala, Moga, Mohali, and Bathinda. Barnala is the home turf of newly appointed state BJP president Kewal Dhillon.

The Congress had a clear majority in Kapurthala, while the BJP won Abohar. In Pathankot, no party was able to get a majority, but the BJP emerged as the single-largest party.

The results are a big boost for the AAP months before the state votes in the crucial Assembly elections in early 2027. Punjab is one of the three Opposition-ruled states/Union Territories in north India along with Himachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir.

Though the urban civic polls are seen as a virtual semi-final before the Assembly polls, in the past, the party that has swept the elections has gone on to be voted out of power in the state. In 2015, the SAD-BJP alliance won 1,420 urban wards while the Congress bagged just 356. However, barely two years later, the Congress stormed to power with 77 of 117 Assembly seats, while the SAD-BJP alliance was reduced to 18.

The pattern repeated last time too. In the 2021 municipal polls, the Congress bagged 1,516 seats across municipal corporations, councils, and nagar panchayats. But months later, in early 2022, the AAP stormed to power with 92 Assembly seats and the Congress fell to 18.

Mann said people had endorsed his government’s work, including “free power to the domestic sector, availability of daytime power supply to farmers, free treatment at Aam Aadmi clinics and rejection of divisive politics”.

Referring to BJP as the “ED (Enforcement Directorate) party”, the CM said ED raids in Punjab and the arrest of Cabinet Minister Sanjeev Arora had failed to influence voters. “People have rejected them completely. They are at number five. Even their former alliance partner SAD has failed to deliver. The AAP alone has won more seats than these four parties combined,” he said.

“The people of Punjab have replied to the ‘ED party’. ‘ED politics’ will not work in Punjab,” said AAP leader and Delhi’s former Deputy CM Manish Sisodia.

For the Congress, while there were isolated pockets of success, its inability to convert Lok Sabha election momentum — it won 7 of 13 parliamentary constituencies — into a strong grassroots organisation will be of concern. Congress insiders said factional rivalries had weakened the party in several towns. At a meeting in New Delhi with the Congress high command, state Congress leaders are learnt to have engaged in a blame game over the party’s poor performance.

Among the pockets where the party performed well was former CM Charanjit Singh Channi’s bastion Chamkaur Sahib, where the party won 11 of the 13 seats. In Kapurthala, Congress MLA Rana Gurjit Singh steered the party to victory with 31 of 50 seats. His son and Independent MLA Rana Inder Partap Singh also saw his candidates dominate the Sultanpur Lodhi municipal council. However, the AAP swept Gidderbaha, the home turf of Punjab Congress chief and Ludhiana MP Amarinder Singh Raja Warring, winning 17 of the 19 wards.

However, Leader of Opposition Partap Singh Bajwa claimed the results were along “expected lines”, saying urban local body polls in Punjab usually favour the ruling party. “The real contest remains between the AAP and the Congress. That is what will happen in the Assembly elections too,” he said.

The BJP aggressively campaigned in urban areas of Punjab, hoping to build on the momentum generated by its Assembly election win in West Bengal. Its expanded footprint and wins in Abohar and Pathankot are likely to propel it forward in the lead-up to the Assembly polls.

SAD spokesperson Parambans Singh Romana said the Akalis still retain support in urban Punjab despite the setback. “The ruling party used every tactic to win these elections. They rejected nomination papers and used ballot boxes. We are Assembly election ready,” he alleged.

The elections were not without controversies this time around. One point of friction was the State Election Commission’s (SEC) decision to conduct the polls using ballot papers instead of electronic voting machines (EVMs). The SEC justified its decision saying not enough EVMs had been supplied in time. The BJP made the issue a major campaign plank, accusing the AAP of trying to manipulate the counting process. Though it took the matter to the Punjab and Haryana High Court and later the Supreme Court, the judiciary refused to intervene.

BJP leaders, however, continued alleging “vote chori” on Friday, with party spokesperson Vineet Joshi accusing the AAP of “all kinds of excesses, from rejecting nomination papers to intimidating candidates and preferring ballot boxes over EVMs”.

The elections to eight municipal corporations, 75 municipal councils, and 20 nagar panchayats were held on May 26 and saw a turnout of 63.94%.