The elections are being held amid Asia’s largest harvesting and procurement operations which are expected to peak during mid-October. The farmers would be busy in their fields for harvesting and later in mandis for procurement.

The voters would elect 83,437 panches apart from the 13,237 sarpanches in the polls to be conducted through ballot boxes, said Chaudhary. The polling will be held between 8 am and 4 pm, he added.

He said the elections to Zila Parishads and municipal bodies would be announced later.

The counting of votes will be done in the same polling booth.

The filing of nominations would start from September 27, from 11 am to 3 pm. The last date to file nominations is October 4, as October 2 and 3 are holidays, while that for withdrawal of nominations is October 7. Scrutiny would be conducted on October 5. Each panchayat will have a Sarpanch each and 5 to 13 panches.

The notification was issued after the High Court questioned the Punjab government on September 19 as to when the state intended to conduct the elections. The term of many panchayats ended in January and currently government officials are running the panchayats.

Chaudhary said that they had considered festival season, public holidays and harvesting of paddy to fix the dates as the commission had to give stipulated time for filing of nominations, withdrawal and campaign. “We know it will be Gandhi Jayanti, Dussehra and then paddy harvesting would be in full swing from October 10. That is why we have finalized this date.”

The Rural Development and Panchayats Department, a few days ago, issued a notification under Section 299 of Panchayati Raj Act that the elections would have to be conducted in the state before October 20.

Chaudhary said that there was a delay in holding panchayat because the government got busy with the Lok Sabha elections.

As the government has amended the rules and barred the sarpanches and panches from contesting elections of party symbols, the SEC said that they would be allowing free symbols for the panches and sarpanches although there would be no political party symbols. There are 173 symbols in all for the panchayat elections. For the election there are 38 available symbols for sarpanches, and 70 for panches, which have not been given to any political party.

The AAP government on August 10, 2023, prematurely dissolved all the gram panchayats, panchayat samitis and zila parishad under the Panchayati Raj Act, paving the way for the elections. The notification was challenged in the Punjab and Haryana High Court and was subsequently withdrawn by the government.

Chaudhary said the expenditure limit for Sarpanch is Rs 40,000 and that for the panches it is Rs 30,000. “There will be an option of NOTA for the voters. During the elections, senior IAS and PCS officers would be deployed as observers”, he added.

“We are writing to deputy commissioners to monitor the expenditure. Nobody will be allowed to deface any property by putting any flag or banner on any property,” Choudhary mentioned.

The Model Code of Conduct would not be implemented in municipal areas, he said.

“In case of panchayats getting elected unanimously, there would be no code of conduct in the village. But if even a single panch would be contesting, then the code would come into place. State ministers would not be able to use official machinery or hold an official meeting in the panchayats. No new scheme in gram panchayat area would not be allowed. No scheme or funds would be allowed,” said Chaudhary.