Not able to deploy SimpleStorage contract in python - error in solcx package

[ghost]

This is my code so far:

from solcx import compile_standard, install_solc
import json
from web3 import Web3

with open("./SimpleStorage.sol", "r") as file:
    simple_storage_file = file.read()

install_solc("0.6.0")

compiled_sol = compile_standard(
    {
        "language": "solidity",
        "sources": {"SimpleStorage.sol": {"content": simple_storage_file}},
        "settings": {
            "outputSelection": {
                "*": {"*": ["abi", "metadata", "evm.bytecode", "evm.sourceMap"]}
            }
        },
    },
    solc_version="0.6.0",
)

with open("compiled_code.json", "w") as file:
    json.dump(compiled_sol, file)

bytecode = compiled_sol["contracts"]["SimpleStorage.sol"]["SimpleStorage"]["evm"][
    "bytecode"
]["object"]
abi = compiled_sol["contracts"]["SimpleStorage.sol"]["SimpleStorage"]["abi"]

w3 = Web3(Web3.HTTPProvider("HTTP://127.0.0.1:7545"))
chain_id = 5777
my_address = "0x19dd90d6824aFee62ee53db0d5C0cc8C90727Ac2"
private_key = "0x5170803577e01f29c21e897299186e8f9b6fccfa98baf927c7c6389283d459ed"

SimpleStorage = w3.eth.contract(abi=abi, bytecode=bytecode)

print(SimpleStorage)

and this is fetching me the below error:

Cannot find solc, installing...
Downloading solc v0.8.12 from https://github.com/ethereum/solidity/releases/download/v0.8.12/solidity-windows.zip
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "D:\.Works\.CS\Web3\web3_py_simple_storage\deploy.py", line 1, in <module>
    from solcx import compile_standard, install_solc
  File "C:\Users\kashy\AppData\Roaming\Python\Python310\site-packages\solcx\__init__.py", line 27, in <module>
    install_solc()
  File "C:\Users\kashy\AppData\Roaming\Python\Python310\site-packages\solcx\install.py", line 87, in install_solc
    _install_solc_windows(version)
  File "C:\Users\kashy\AppData\Roaming\Python\Python310\site-packages\solcx\install.py", line 156, in _install_solc_windows
    with zipfile.ZipFile(BytesIO(request.content)) as zf:
  File "C:\Users\kashy\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python310\lib\zipfile.py", line 1258, in __init__
    self._RealGetContents()
  File "C:\Users\kashy\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python310\lib\zipfile.py", line 1325, in _RealGetContents
    raise BadZipFile("File is not a zip file")
zipfile.BadZipFile: File is not a zip file

Been at it for 3 hours now, tried every troubleshooting solution out there yet not able to solve this. Please advise
@PatrickAlphaC a little help please

[cromewar]

Hello @KashyapPanchal
This is most likely due to your python version, 3.10 has problem with web3 technologies.
Could you try using python 3.8 or 3.9 on a virtualenv?
Use this as reference.