Ujjain: Despite protest registered by both arch political rival parties BJP and Congress, the district administration on Thursday gave final shape to delimit present 54 numbers of wards of Ujjain Municipal Corporation (UMC) to 60. The UMC elections are scheduled to be held in the mid-2020 and as per state government’s decision, there will be ‘indirect’ election (by elected corporators) of mayor instead of direct election (by people).
FORTNIGHT EXERCISE FAVOURS ‘ADMINISTRATIVE’ DELIMITATION: The primary publication of new wards and their maps were done about a fortnight ago and seven day’s time was given for submission of objections and suggestions before the district election officer that is collector Shashank Mishra. Initially, UMC commissioner Pratibha Pal acting on a resolution of UMC council made some two years ago and in pursuance to a circular of the urban administration and development department (UADD) had undertaken the delimitation process. Census of 2011 was considered for this entire exercise. Present 54 wards were thus delimited to 60, keeping in mind balance of population and area of the wards. After receiving 80 submissions, collector had asked the municipal commissioner to reply on them. The entire team of UMC along with District Urban Development Authority officials sat for settlement of suggestions and received objections throughout Thursday and sent five copies of the final status to collector at about 9 pm for his signatures. Sources informed that collector after making his signature on these documents may take approval of the divisional commissioner Ajeet Kumar and will on Friday send it to UADD, Bhopal which will take final decision on the delimitation and may issue a gazette notification on it before February 2020.
POLITICAL PARTIES NOT IN FAVOUR: Early since the UMC’s administrative authorities launched delimitation process and decided to raise the present number of city wards from 54 to 60, BJP and Congress parties echoed voices of discontent. Most of the leaders of these parties said that the authorities have kept the provisions of the concerned Act on sidelines and exhibited their administrative autocracy only. Indications suggest that number of voters and borders of a ward of at least present 17 wards are going to disturb following this delimitation and equations of SC voters which dominates the civic politics may get topsy-turvy. Neither the BJP, which is ruling UMC, nor the Congress, which is ruling the State, gave its nod to the delimitation proposal and formally submitted their suggestions to the collector. However, it is learnt that both municipal commissioner and collector on Thursday rejected all the 80 submissions. A concerned officer disclosed to Free Press that all such submissions were in the request form and thus were treated as suggestion only and not as objection. “If such submissions had been concrete, they might be considered seriously,” the officer quipped.
RULERS FEEL NEGLECTED: The Congress party and its local leaders tried their level best to get cancelled the entire delimitation process, but to no avail. In open they cited certain provisions of the concerned Act to go through their stance that without formal gazette notification on behalf of State government, the UMC authorities can not initiate delimitation process. But, in private, most of the Congress leaders feared that increased number of (60) wards may change the political equations against them. On Thursday, PWD Minister and District In-charge Sajjan Singh Verma reportedly rang to collector and commissioner and pressed for the Congress’ view point. But, it is reliably learnt that, both collector and commissioner expressed their inability to cooperate on the pretext that the entire election process to come may get affected if they do not go ahead with the proposed delimitation.
WHAT NEXT?
As per reports, BJP may knock the doors of High Court against the delimitation carried out by the authorities of UMC and district administration. On the other hand, Congress may first rely on the divisional commissioner’s move, who enjoys full authority to interfere in the UMC affairs. As a second step, Congress leaders may exert pressure on the Chief Minister Kamal Nath to cancel the entire delimitation process. “We are watching everything carefully. The local authorities have done certain mistakes in delimitation process and their steps are politically in-correct. As we enjoy power in State, we have option to request the CM to order cancellation of delimitation order and to conduct the UMC elections for 54 wards only and not on 60 wards,” a former MLA requesting anonymity told this correspondent.
MAP OF PROPOSED DELIMITATION OF CITY WARDS
