The Supreme Court has set aside elections held in 50 municipal wards in Punjab and ordered fresh polls after a fact-finding commission reported “widespread obstruction” during the nomination process. A bench comprising Chief Justice Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and V Mohana directed that elections be held again in 28 wards in Patiala district and 22 wards in Moga. The local body elections in Punjab were held on December 21, 2024. The court’s order followed its acceptance of the findings and recommendations of a commission that examined allegations of irregularities and obstruction during the nomination process in the affected wards.

The one-member commission was headed by former Punjab and Haryana High Court judge Nirmaljit Kaur and was appointed by the Supreme Court on March 24, 2025. It submitted its report to the court on November 18 that year after examining the circumstances surrounding the filing of nominations in the affected wards. The commission’s findings were considered by the Supreme Court before it directed fresh elections. The court noted allegations that candidates faced serious interference while attempting to participate in the electoral process, including incidents involving their nomination papers and physical obstruction.

According to the findings referred to by the Supreme Court, nomination papers were allegedly snatched, torn or destroyed during the process. The commission also recorded allegations that candidates were assaulted, detained or threatened. The findings formed the basis for the court’s decision to order re-election in the 50 wards rather than allow the results of the earlier polls to stand. The court accepted the commission’s recommendations and directed that the entire process of conducting fresh elections be completed within six weeks. The order was passed on September 28 and was uploaded on Wednesday, bringing the findings and directions into the public domain.

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Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, who appeared for the Punjab government, told the Supreme Court that the state had no objection to the recommendations made by the commission. The court subsequently issued a series of directions aimed at ensuring greater oversight and transparency during the fresh electoral process. It directed the Chief Justice of the Punjab and Haryana High Court to nominate two or three senior members of the High Court Bar as observers for the re-election process. The observers will monitor key stages of the exercise and report on the conduct of the fresh polls.

The Supreme Court further ordered that the filing and scrutiny of nomination papers, allocation of election symbols and polling in the affected wards be videographed in the presence of the appointed observers. The recordings are to be preserved and subsequently handed over to a monitoring committee constituted for the purpose. The measures are intended to create a documented record of the fresh electoral process and allow the monitoring committee to examine proceedings if questions arise about compliance with the court’s directions. The court’s intervention places particular emphasis on the nomination stage, given that the commission’s findings identified alleged obstruction during that part of the earlier election process.

The state government has also been directed to provide the monitoring committee with ward-wise details of officials deployed for election duty, along with the names of police officers of the rank of Deputy Superintendent of Police and above. These details will allow the monitoring mechanism to track the administrative and security arrangements in each of the 50 wards. The Supreme Court has fixed a six-week deadline for completing the re-election process, covering the required stages from nominations and scrutiny to symbol allocation and polling. The fresh elections will apply to 28 wards in Patiala district and 22 in Moga, following the court’s decision to set aside the earlier polls in those constituencies based on the commission’s findings of obstruction during nominations.

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