Wards redrawn to help Shiv Sena: Opposition

While the restructuring of wards has added only nine electoral wards, the boundaries of almost 75 per cent of them have changed. Many corporators allege that the wards are restructured in such a way that the ruling party may secure seats by a large margin. In the last election, there were at least 26 seats where the margin between the winning candidate and the closest opponent was less than 1,000 votes.

The BMC published the draft of 236 wards on February 1, and today is the last day to submit suggestions, objections regarding them. The objections have to be submitted at ward levels and the number of objections may cross 500 on the last day. The main objections are non-adherence to natural boundaries, like roads, nullah, railway line, etc., or that the electoral wards are not aligned to the administrative wards.

The BMC published the draft of 236 wards on February 1. File pic

"The ruling party won or lost in around 12 wards with a margin of fewer than 1,000 votes. We can see many wards in the draft where a so-called favourable area has been added to these wards to secure more votes. In some other wards, areas that are favourable for opponent parties got clubbed, so where the Opposition candidate earlier won by 2,000 votes, may now win by a margin of 4,000 to 5,000, but at the same time, the ruling party may get a better chance to win in the adjacent ward," said a corporator on the condition of anonymity.

A corporator from another party said, "In the civic poll, a vote bank of 500 can change the result. We can see the same logic to cut wards. The nine additional wards are in areas where the ruling party dominates." He said, for example, now all six wards in Mulund are with the BJP. Even though not a single ward has increased in the area, the boundaries are restructured such that the other party may get a chance to increase votes.

Many of the objections have alluded to boundaries and discomfort of citizens. "One electoral ward which earlier fell under B administrative ward has now been divided between B, C and E wards. How can one corporator run in three wards for the work?" said a corporator. Similarly, another ward in the northern suburbs has also been divided between R Central and R North administrative wards.

"In 2012, while increasing wards, they were aligned to administrative wards like A, K East, L, etc, and even during the restructuring of wards in 2017, the boundaries were kept within one administrative ward. But now, a sizeable portion of the wards is getting divided and it will impact the work in the wards," said a corporator.

In 2017, out of 227 seats, there were at least 26 seats where the margin between winner and opponent was less than 1,000 votes. Of these 26 seats, 9 were won by BJP, 8 by Shiv Sena. While Congress won 4 seats, NCP got 3 seats by less than 1,000-vote margins. One corporator from MNS and two independent corporators also won by a thinner margin.

Feb 1
Day the BMC published the draft list of wards