Mumbai civic polls: BJP smells political motive as BMC gets 9 more electoral wards

Sena workers at a rally ahead of the last BMC elections in February 2017. File/AFP

A fortnight after the state Cabinet increased the number of elected representatives in civic bodies except Mumbai by at least 17 per cent for the forthcoming elections, the government has added nine new wards to the state capital's existing 227 electoral segments. While the Congress welcomed the move, the BJP said it was driven by political motives. BMC polls are scheduled to be held early next year. The revised strength of the house in BMC will now be 236 in the full-term elections.

Currently, the number of seats is based on the 2001 Census. Mumbai's house strength wasn't revised even after the 2011 Census which showed a population growth of 3.87 per cent. And now since the 2021 Census findings are expected to get delayed further because of the pandemic, the rate of average population growth has been considered to revise the city's electoral segments. Urban Development minister Eknath Shinde told the media persons after the cabinet meeting on Wednesday that difficulties in managing the thickly populated wards was considered for restructuring. "With this, we can provide better services and balance the development," he said.

Ravi Raja, Congress corporator and leader of the opposition, said, "I welcome the decision taken by the MVA government. Population in every ward should be proportionate so as to carry out development work. The BJP will oppose all decisions of the MVA government. There are serious issues related to the redrawing of wards which took place before the last election. When seats increase, delimitation has to be done."

Slamming the decisions, BJP spokesperson Bhalchandra Shirsat said, "Why only nine electoral wards increased? It is just a political move to postpone the election. A decision was taken a few days ago to increase 15 per cent wards in all corporations except Mumbai. Then why do they wait for Mumbai. MVA government and Sena are scared of elections. They think increasing the number of wards will help them."

While the BMC submitted data on restructuring the electoral wards to the State Election Commission in the last week of October, a tussle over ward boundaries has begun ahead of the 2022 civic elections. The BJP has now opposed BMC's data on restructuring of wards. Its group leader Prabhakar Shinde wrote to the SEC that in the absence of the 2021 Census, the redrawing of boundaries is only an attempt at political gains. It has also threatened to move the court. In 2017, Congress and Shiv Sena had alleged that the government of that time changed ward boundaries to create more wards in the western and suburbs to favour the BJP.

Scene at other big corporations

Last month, the cabinet approved the new numbers for several corporations, including all others in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR). The minimum and maximum limit has been decided as per the population. Following the decision, Navi Mumbai will have 122 corporators (currently 111), Thane 142 (131), Kalyan-Dombivli 133 (122), Mira-Bhayander 106 (95), Bhiwandi-Nizampur 101 (90), Ulhasnagar 89 (78), Panvel 89 (78) and Vasai-Virar 126 (115).

Beyond MMR, the state's second most populated city, Pune, will get 173 (162) seats, the second after Mumbai which has the highest number. Second capital Nagpur will have its number increased to 156 from 151. Nasik gets 133 (122), while Pimpri-Chinchwad will have 139, up from 128.

About 25 civic corporations, including Mumbai, Thane, Nagpur are slated to go to polls next year. A lot is at stake for the Maha Vikas Aghadi partners, and the single largest party and yet principal opposition, Bharatiya Janata Party. Earlier, the government had ordered restructuring of the wards to multi-member ones with a cap of three per segment. Mumbai will again be an exception to this. The statewide exercise will not be altered to accommodate the increase in the numbers.

236
BMC's House strength after Cabinet decision

227
Strength of BMC's present House