Mumbai: Ahead of municipal elections, BMC to reconfirm ward boundaries

In 2017, seven electoral wards from the Island city were shifted to the Western and Eastern suburbs. Representation pic/Pradeep Dhivar

A major rejig of the ward boundaries was carried out five years back, but the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has again been asked by the State Election Commission (SEC) to reconfirm the boundaries. While the BMC will continue to take the 2011 population census as their base, whether the existing demography will be a reason for extreme changes again is yet to be determined. While the civic officials have maintained that it is just a process of reconfirming boundaries, sources revealed that past errors if any are likely to be rectified, and will be submitted to the SEC soon.

The BMC has started the field work where the 24 wards' office staff along with the assessment department and collector's staff are physically checking the ward boundaries. They will then draw a draft of the same and submit it to the SEC. The BMC will try to rectify any past errors by emphasising physical examination instead of just relying on GPS, which was heavily used during the 2017 delimitation process. The findings will then be put up for suggestions and objections process. After the exercise, the final electoral maps will be the first step for political parties to weigh their candidature options, and will also help citizens know which electoral ward their area falls under, sources revealed.

Politicians eagerly awaiting

In 2017 delimitation had upset many of the candidates' winning chances, so politicians are now eyeing if the new drafts will bring them some relief or upset them even further. The Congress had earlier alleged that the delimitation process during the BJP government was not fair, and thus needed to be done again. A leader said, "After this draft is sent to the SEC, we are expecting some major changes that are put out for public suggestions and objections. For now, the BMC officers are just verifying the ward boundaries."

The delimitation exercise was taken up by BMC as per the directives of the election commission owing to a population shift that was noticed after the 2011 census. The civic body had formed the new wards on the basis of the population which was kept constant to about 54,000 in each electoral ward, except in few cases where permission of the state election commission was taken to increase or reduce the population. By following this process, in 2017, seven electoral wards from the Island city were shifted to the Western and Eastern suburbs and 90 per cent of the ward boundaries were changed in this process.