Mumbai : As the country’s richest civic body, Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) gears up for the upcoming elections, the bulk of the seats this time will be from the suburbs of Mumbai and fewer in the island city. The elections to the 227 member house of the civic body are to be held before March 5, 2017.
Sanjay Deshmukh, Additional Municipal Commissioner, on Friday said that the increasing population will have an impact on the coming elections with more seats moving to the Northern suburbs.
Now 44 corporators will be elected from the island city compared to the previous 63. Accordingly, the number of corporators to be elected in the Eastern and Western suburbs will rise from 97 to 101 and 67 to 82 corporators, respectively. The total number of seats in the corporation will remain the same.
According to the data provided by Deshmukh, the population in the island city has declined by 3 per cent whereas it has shot up by eight per cent in the suburbs. The island city has a population of 24 lakhs whereas it is 45 lakhs in the eastern suburbs and 55 lakhs in the western suburbs.
Therefore, a number of divisions in the island city will be shifted to the suburbs, increasing the number of administrative divisions in the city’s suburbs and also, the number of corporation seats.
In 2012, the city had a population of 1,19,78,450, out of which 1,02,86,579 voted. The city’s current population is 1,24,42,373 while voters registered till now are a mere 91,87,278. A voter registration drive is on currently and conclude by August 31.
Deshmukh said that the constituencies will be further sub-divided according to the population in that particular area. This means that there will be one corporator for a population up to 55,000.
Therefore, to further make it more convenient for voters to vote, the MCGM is planning to install one poll booth per km.
[alert type=”e.g. warning, danger, success, info” title=””] It further announced the schedules for the voter names to be registered. For the BMC’s 2017 polls, youngsters who attain 18 years of age by January 1, 2017 will be eligible for voting. Voters will have to register their names by August 31 2016. Citizens can log into www.ceo.maharashtra.gov.in or else www.electionmsd.blogspot.in, for more information. Also the toll free no.
is 1800-22-1950. [/alert]
