Chandigarh, Jan. 21 -- As the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) sits comfortably with 18 councillors on its side, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Congress have reached a "one-time agreement" to fight together and defeat the saffron party in the Chandigarh mayoral elections slated for January 29. With this, the India Bloc too will have 18 votes - 11 of the AAP councillors, six of the Congress and one of Chandigarh MP Manish Tewari who holds an ex officio vote in the House. This sets the stage for a draw in the House, in the event of which, the law mandates that the mayor be decided by a draw of lots, turning the high-stakes contest into a matter of chance. As per the informal arrangement between the two alliance partners, the AAP will fight for the mayor's post while the Congress will contest the senior deputy mayor and deputy mayor polls. A formal announcement will be made by the top leadership of the two parties, insiders said. The last date for filing nominations is January 22. Leaders of both parties maintain that this is a "strictly one-time arrangement" and that they will be fighting the MC general elections, slated in December, independently. A senior AAP leader said that while it has been informally decided to contest the election jointly, the understanding would be termed an "adjustment" and not a formal alliance, as it is meant only for this election. Chandigarh Congress president HS Lucky said the primary objective of the understanding is to defeat the BJP in the mayoral polls. He added that senior party leaders are expected to arrive on Wednesday to take a final call on the arrangement. The BJP's strength had risen to 18 last month after AAP councillors Poonam (Ward 16) and Suman Sharma (Ward 4) formally joined the party at its Sector 33 office. According to sources, the BJP's probable mayoral candidates include Maheshinder Singh Sidhu, Saurabh Joshi and Kanwarjit Singh Rana. From the AAP-Congress combine, AAP councillors Yogesh Dhingra, Hardeep Singh and Damanpreet Singh are among the likely contenders. The January 29 election will be the last mayoral poll of the House elected in 2022. It will also be for the first time in Chandigarh's history that the mayor will be elected through an open show of hands instead of a secret ballot. The change follows an amendment approved in July last year by Punjab governor and UT administrator Gulab Chand Kataria to Regulation 6 of the Chandigarh Municipal Corporation (Procedure and Conduct of Business) Regulations, 1996, aimed at curbing cross-voting and ballot tampering. Despite lacking a clear majority in the House, the BJP has won the mayoral election three times in the last four terms, largely due to cross-voting. In the 2022 elections, BJP's Sarabjit Kaur Dhillon secured the mayor's post after defeating AAP's Anju Katyal by one vote. This even as the AAP had 14 councillors in the House and the saffron party had 12. The Congress and the lone SAD councillor had abstained from voting in these elections. In 2023, BJP's Anup Gupta won as the AAP and the Congress failed to form an alliance. The 2024 mayoral election became one of the most controversial in Chandigarh's political history. Presiding officer Anil Masih, a nominated councillor, was caught on camera allegedly tampering with eight ballots cast for AAP-Congress candidate Kuldeep Kumar Dhalor, favouring BJP's Manoj Sonkar instead. Despite the alliance holding 20 councillors, the final tally showed 16 votes for Sonkar and 12 for Dhalor. AAP and Congress moved the Supreme Court, where the then Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud strongly reprimanded the misconduct, saying: "He is murdering democracy. Is this how an officer conducts elections?" The court eventually declared Dhalor the rightful winner, calling the tampering "deliberate". The incident triggered widespread outrage and dealt a blow to the BJP during the Lok Sabha campaign. In 2025, BJP's Harpreet Kaur Babla won the mayoral position after cross-voting from opposition councillors helped tip the numbers....