Govt releases final delimitation report with 225 wards

The state government on Monday released the final delimitation report for 225 wards of the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), paving the way for the civic body elections pending for the past three years.

Sources in the Urban Development Department (UDD) said that citizens raised close to 3,200 objections on the draft notification released on August 18. “Of this, we have accepted 1,702 objections, and a total of 68 wards have been impacted,” a senior UDD official said. Most of the changes concerned ward names or their boundaries, the official added.

Although senior BBMP officials said that most objections were considered and changes effected, citizens and political leaders were disappointed by the notification.

Srikanth Narasimhan, Bengaluru NavaNirmana Party (BNP) co-founder and general secretary, said that the government only made cosmetic changes and failed at a fundamental level.

“We have submitted a number of objections and suggestions. But many of them have not been considered. For instance, the CV Raman Nagar ward now lies on either side of a railway line and this does not make any sense. Though we raised an objection, the government has not considered it. Similarly, the Bellandur ward had a huge population and it had to be split. But that has also not been considered,” he said.

BJP leaders dubbed the notification “politically motivated”.

NR Ramesh, a former corporator of Yediyur and Opposition party leader in the BBMP, alleged that the government had made changes only to wards that belonged to corporators who had jumped to the Congress from the BJP after the release of the draft notification.

“According to my sources, not a single objection was raised from Yediyur ward. However, the government has gone ahead and made changes from the draft to the final notification. It has made a blunder in the process. Nearly nine booths are present in both Yediyur and Ganesha Mandir wards. This clearly shows that the delimitation has not been done scientifically,” he said.

While the final notification is expected to pave the way for elections, the reservation matrix is yet to be decided and this, a few leaders said, may delay the process.

Legal hurdles 

Despite assertions by Congress leaders that the BBMP council polls will be held by December, the plans may run into legal hurdles.

Bommanahalli MLA M Satish Reddy, who had contested the delimitation report prepared in 2022, said that he would approach the Karnataka High Court against the new report as well.

“Bommanahalli has over 4.55 lakh voters and the number of wards has been reduced from 14 to 12. There are other constituencies such as Jayanagar and BTM Layout which do not have half as many voters, but have been divided into eight to nine wards. This is not acceptable,” he said.

Sources said that some Residents Welfare Associations (RWAs) and civic groups may also join the legal battle.