Delimitation panel adjusts population across MCD wards in final report

Municipal wards in Delhi will have 40,000-89,000 voters with seats spread across 24 assembly constituencies undergoing major changes in terms of name and size, according to the final report by the delimitation commission that was constituted by the central government following the merger of the three civic bodies into a unified MCD.

The Union home ministry accepted and notified the final delimitation report through two notifications issued on October 17, paving the way for holding municipal elections in Delhi. The polls were abruptly cancelled in March this year when the Centre announced that the three civic bodies in the city will be merged. A unified MCD came into being in May.

A senior official associated with the delimitation process on Wednesday said boundaries of the wards have been carved out to reduce the variation in population in each ward — from 35,000-90,000 in the draft report to 40,000-89,000 in the final report. He added that this was done in view of the huge variation in population being one of the main objections raised by the political parties and citizens.

The smallest ward under the new set up will be Kanjhawala with 40,467 people, and the largest ward will be Mayur Vihar Phase-1 with a population of 88,878.

“Based on feedback, the panel has approved name changes of wards in 15 cases while major population variation has occurred in 24 assembly constituencies,” the official said, and added that overall 1,720 objections were received after draft report was shared in the public domain.

A total of 23 wards have been removed and one ward has been introduced in order to reduce the total number of wards from 272 to 250.

The 2011 Census was used as the basis for distribution of population across the 250 wards, the official added. “The process was finalised while ensuring each ward has a well defined boundary such as a drain or a road within the assembly constituency,” he explained.

Under the population moderation exercise, some of the smaller wards where more areas have been added include Laxmi Nagar where population has gone up from 35684 to 47859; IP Extension with increase from 44756 to 60343; Sri Ram Colony raised from 42,819 to 83,347; Gokalpuri raised from 44658 to 73,943; Chandi Chowk hike from 35,509 to 51,672 people and Chandni Mahal increased from 49995 to 58,169 people under the ward. Similarly, in the upper end of the spectrum, areas have been removed from Mayur Vihar-I to reduce population from 93381 to 88,878; Trilokpuri reduced from 91, 991 to 88792 Sangam Vihar-A ward brought down from 89, 899 to 73215 people; Burari goes from 82052 to 71180 while the Harsh Vihar wards will see reduction of population from 87,009 to 78698. Similar reduction of population has been observed in wards like Sarup Nagar, Aman Vihar, Nihal Vihar among other sites.

A second official associated with the delimitation exercise said that the panel approved 15 name change proposals based on the feedback received on the draft report. “In many cases, we received petitions to restore the original names. We took the decision based on major landmarks or the largest colony in the area. For instance, the name of Kanjhawala was proposed to be changed to Karala, but the final order has restored the original name,” the official added.

Delhi had last witnessed a delimitation exercise of municipal wards in 2016-17 before which the 68 assemblies were divided in 4 wards each. At the end of the 2017 exercise, the number started varying from 3 wards to 7 wards in places like Matiala. The 2022 delimitation exercise has ensured that 38 assemblies will have 3 wards each; 17 assemblies with 4 wards; 10 assemblies with 5 wards and 3 assemblies (Vikaspuri, Matiala and Bawana) will have maximum weightage of 6 wards. Among the 23 wards that have been permanently shelved include wards like Vivek Vihar, GTB Nagar, Anand Parbat and Tagore Garden. Most of these shelved wards fell under the erstwhile North and South MCDs while East Delhi’s Mustafabad assembly is the only case where panel has proposed to raise the ward count.

Poll preparations continue

With the delimitation exercise now over, the focus has now shifted to the state election commission and the preparations for holding municipal elections in Delhi.

Anil Gupta, retired chief law officer of the north corporation, said the next step towards elections will be determination of the reservation wards for which the MHA has empowered the state election commission (SEC) through a notification dated October 17.

An SEC official said the chief election officer will also start the process for reconciliation of the electoral rolls according to new ward boundaries. “The updated electoral rolls will be reconciled with these boundaries so that people can be informed about the current wards they fall under,” official said. To be sure, the ward boundaries have been fixed as per the 2011 census while the electoral rolls keep on changing with migration and addition in population. The state election commission on Wednesday has also completed the exercise of rechecking and certifying the 56,000 EVMs which will be used for the elections. The machines stored in Town hall and SEC office were last checked in March earlier this year for the MCD polls that were supposed to be held in April 2022.

“All EVMs have been checked by teams from election commission and technical experts from ECIL Electronics Corporation of India Limited. We have verified that buttons are functional, data is recorded correctly in each of these EVMs which have been certified and sealed,” official explained.