BBMP delimitation: 3 Congress-held Assembly seats lose one ward each

In what might snowball into a controversy, only three Assembly constituencies — all represented by the opposition Congress party — have lost a ward each as per the draft report of the BBMP delimitation notified on Thursday.

Jayanagar, Shivajinagar and Chamarajpet — all located in the city’s core — now have only six wards each, down from the earlier seven each.

There are no wards called Jayanagar and Shivajinagar. Jayanagar (East), which came under the Chickpet Assembly constituency, doesn’t exist any more either.

The Shivajinagar ward, which spanned most of the eponymous locality, has been merged with the Jayamahal ward, which also comprises some parts of the Ramaswamy Palya ward.

The reduction appeared stark as the number of wards remained unchanged in other Assembly constituencies in the city’s core. These include Malleswaram, Shanthinagar, Gandhinagar, Rajajinagar, Chikpet, Hebbal and Pulakeshinagar but their ward boundaries may have changed.

Read | BBMP ward delimitation draft notified; polls likely by October

Roads, lakes, stormwater drains, railway tracks, compound walls, etc have been used as marking points while fixing the boundaries of the new wards. Each ward approximately has a population of 34,500.

A total of 243 wards were carved out of the existing 198 wards based on the population figures of census 2011.

Bengaluru-based consultancy Pixel, which was roped in during the previous exercise, is learnt to have worked on the new delimitation report. Some legislators were consulted during the exercise, sources said.

MLAs described the reduction in wards as “gerrymandering” to favour the ruling party.

Sowmya Reddy, Jayanagar MLA, sees it as a ploy to further delay the BBMP polls.

“By publishing a report that is unscientifically done, the government indirectly wants more people to challenge it in the court and thereby delay the polls,” she told DH.

She added: “Instead of focusing on providing ease of governance by redrawing the boundaries, what the ruling party has done is to gerrymander. It is done to cut the votes of the opposition candidates by zeroing in on booths that give pictures of whom the voters are voting,” she said.

Shivajinagar MLA Rizwan Arshad echoed Reddy. “It’s unfortunate that a core area like Shivajinagar has been deprived of a ward. There was no need to decrease our wards,” he
said.

Stating that all administrative offices are located in the Shivajinagar Assembly constituency, he said it actually needed one more ward.

Calling the delimitation exercise “unscientific”, he said no MLA from the Congress party was consulted. “How do you ask when there was no consultative process. The delimitation happened in the BJP office. It was a closed-door exercise,” he said.

The voter population in Shivajinagar earlier was 1.98 lakh. Some 12,000-13,000 voters were later deleted. The Jayamahal ward has also been delimited, he said. “It’s a little dicey,” he added.

The MLA said they would definitely challenge the ward delimitation.