Boundaries of 24 electoral wards to be redrawn

Twenty-four electoral wards of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) will see further changes to their boundaries on Tuesday as part of the final stage of the delimitation process, say sources. The wards that will have their boundaries redrawn include G/South (Worli, Mahalaxmi, Lower Parel), G/North (Mahim, Matunga, Dadar west), S (Bhandup, Powai), L (Kurla) and R/South (Kandivli) among others.

The civic body’s delimitation exercise in October— to redraw the city’s electoral map on the basis of the 2011 census — had already upset the strategies of political parties, with changes made to 90 per cent of the city’s 227 electoral wards.

A review committee appointed by the state election commission to hear citizens’ suggestions and objections to the exercise accepted 11 complaints on Thursday, based on which the final changes in boundaries of 24 wards will be published on the BMC’s website by Tuesday, said civic officials.

The delimitation exercise was taken up by the BMC as per the directives of the election commission, owing to a population shift that was noticed after the 2011 census. With just three months left to the civic polls, these final electoral maps will be the first step for political parties to weigh their options while fielding candidates, sources said.

The complaints include wrongly-marked boundaries that divided one society across two wards, one open play ground across two wards among others.

A senior civic officer, on the condition of anonymity, said, “The complaints from few big housing complexes that were getting divided across two wards have been considered by the committee. These fresh changes to ward boundaries will also result in the shift of about 1,000 people from one ward to another.”

The civic body had initially formed the new wards on the basis of 2011 census, which was kept constant to about 54,000 in one electoral ward, except in a few cases, where the permission of the state election commission was taken to increase or reduce the population depending on their geographical boundaries.

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