The nomination papers of Sukhwinder Singh alias Sukhwinder Bihla, the husband of ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA Sarvjit Kaur Manuke, were rejected from ward number 1 for the Jagraon Municipal Council elections on Tuesday. The ward is reserved for women candidates.

However, Jagraon MLA Manuke told The Indian Express that it was an act of “mischief,” as her husband “never filed any nomination papers from the ward reserved for women candidates,” and that AAP’s candidate from the ward is Paramjit Kaur.

“Why would my husband file a nomination from a ward reserved for women? This is a mischief by some opponent who filed papers in my husband’s name. We have finalised the list of all 23 AAP candidates for the Jagraon Municipal Council elections. Why would my husband file papers when he wasn’t even a candidate on the party’s list? We are trying to find who did this,” said the MLA.

Ravi Chopra, returning officer for the Jagraon Municipal Council polls, said that the papers of “Sukhwinder Singh” were rejected as the file was “incomplete”.

“The file does not have any details of the candidate. It has been rejected,” Chopra said.

Asked how the nomination was accepted when it lacked basic details of the candidate, he said: “I was not on duty when the nominations were accepted. I have scrutinised the nominations and rejected incomplete files.”

Sukhwinder Singh said he was clueless about the development. He told The Indian Express: “I have no idea who did this, but I never filed any nomination papers. I officially write my name as ‘Prof Sukhwinder Singh’, and sometimes I use ‘Bihla’ along with my name, which is the name of my ancestral village. Why would I file a nomination from a ward reserved for women? Kisi ne sharat kiti hai (Someone has done a mischief).”

Meanwhile, taking a dig at the AAP, the Punjab Congress posted on X: “This is the government of Badlaav. He must have thought that my wife is MLA, so the reserved ward is also ours. So much confidence while filing papers that the rulebook must be saying: “He is from MLA’s family so let him go.” But this time, the system said: “Sir, in a democracy, you don’t get everything as a family package.”

Jagraon Municipal Council election is slated for May 26.