BJP state chief spokesperson Rakesh Jamwal released a detailed chargesheet against the Congress government led by Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu ahead of the Municipal Corporation elections in Mandi on Thursday. He accused the government of indulging in corruption, administrative failure and stalling development projects in the district. He alleged that the Congress government had pushed Mandi towards ‘mismanagement and destruction’ during its three-and-a-half-year tenure. Jamwal accused the state government of failing to provide relief to people during the natural disaster in Mandi last year when 14 persons lost their lives while 31 persons went missing and over 150 houses were damaged. Ministers did not visit the affected areas for nearly 25 days and the relief and rehabilitation work was inadequate.
The Sundernagar MLA also highlighted the drinking water crisis of 2024 and 2025 and said that around 35 supply schemes were affected and around 75 per cent of water sources dried up. He claimed that water supply was disrupted in several areas of Mandi city for days due to damaged supply pipelines.
Jamwal alleged that the Congress government deliberately obstructed projects in the Mandi Municipal Corporation area and did not fill vacant posts, as a result development funds remained unused. He added that the government stopped the Rs 250 crore Shiv Dham project and halted the work on the proposed Mandi Airport Project despite Central funding approval.
The BJP also accused the government of delaying the local body elections by adopting administrative tactics and misusing the Disaster Management Act. Jamwal alleged that roads and bridges damaged due to floods, including the Kun Ka Tar bridge and the Suketi Khad bridge, were not repaired on time, severely affecting commuters.
He alleged there was corruption in the Jal Shakti Department and vigilance raids had exposed irregularities in tender allotment. Jamwal accused the government of weakening Sardar Patel University by denying it adequate support.
Meanwhile, the scrutiny of nomination papers for the upcoming elections to panchayati raj institutions in Mandi district was completed on Wednesday. As many as 54 nomination papers were rejected for various reasons during scrutiny while 14,565 candidates were declared eligible to contest the elections.
District Election Officer-cum-Deputy Commissioner Apporv Devgan said that the candidates, whose nominations had been found to be valid, could withdraw their names between 11 am and 3 pm till tomorrow. After the completion of the withdrawal process, election symbols would be allotted to the candidates after 3 pm tomorrow.
A total of 14,619 nomination papers had been filed for 4,768 seats of Zila Parishad and panchayat samiti members, panchayat pradhans, up-pradhans and Ward members. Out of these, 14,565 nominations were found to be valid.
The Deputy Commissioner said that for 36 posts of Zila Parishad member, 210 nomination papers had been submitted but only one nomination from the Behal-25 ward was rejected. Besides, four candidates had submitted two nomination papers each for the same post. Since both nominations were found to be valid, the additional nomination papers of each candidate was rejected, as per the election rules. Consequently, 205 candidates are in the fray for the Zila Parishad elections.
For the elections to 267 posts of members of 14 panchayat samitis, 1,175 nomination papers were received. Of these, six nominations were rejected during scrutiny while 1,169 nominations were found to be valid. The Deputy Commissioner said that for the 577 posts of gram panchayat pradhan, 3,008 nomination papers were filed and 2,995 of them were found to be valid.
