Ruckus in Thiruvananthapuram corporation council meeting over ward delimitation

A council meeting of the Thiruvananthapuram Corporation on Wednesday witnessed ruckus over the delimitation of wards in the civic body with the Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the United Democratic Front (UDF) alleging that the exercise was out with a view to benefit the ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) in the local body elections next year.

The council meeting began with Mayor Arya Rajendran speaking on the awards that the Corporation recently won, including the Global Award for Sustainable Development in Cities, an initiative led by the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN Habitat) and the Shanghai Municipality. The sloganeering from the Opposition benches began immediately, demanding the Mayor’s resignation over the way the delimitation was carried out.

The BJP councillors questioned the need for changing the contours of almost all the wards across the Corporation for adding one more ward to the civic body. Meanwhile, the UDF councillors held up banners alleging collusion between the LDF and the BJP in the delimitation exercise to disadvantage the UDF. The LDF councillors maintained that the Corporation authorities or the LDF did not have a hand in the delimitation process, which was carried out by the delimitation commission.

The ward delimitation was done considering the number of houses and population in each ward. The division of wards was done keeping an average of 4,100 houses, with 10% tolerance on either side, in each ward. Currently, the population distribution between the wards is hugely uneven.

As the sloganeering continued, the meeting ended quickly after passing the agenda for the day.

Published - November 27, 2024 07:05 pm IST