Mumbai News: BJP Forms 27-Member Steering Committee For BMC Polls; First Report Due By July 7

The BJP has declared its steering committee for BMC elections, which is tasked to conduct comprehensive ward-wise review and submit detailed reports to its Mumbai BJP President and minister Ashish Shelar.

The key job of the committee will be to spread head party's election strategy. The committee members are expected to submit their first report to Mumbai BJP office by July 7.

The announcement of BJP's steering committee comes days after the state government amended the civic poll process to bring electoral ward boundary drafting under its direct oversight through the Urban Development Department (UDD) — a step that could tilt the scales in favour of the ruling BJP-led Mahayuti alliance in the upcoming municipal elections. 

The steering committee for the BMC elections which is headed by Shelar himself, consists 27 key Mumbai BJP leaders, including current and former MPs, MLAs, former corporators and Yuva morcha leaders. 

The responsibility for reviewing the North Mumbai district has been assigned to MLAs Atul Bhatkhalkar and Yogesh Sagar. The North West district will be reviewed by MLAs Ameet Satam and Vidya Thakur. MLA Mihir Kotecha and former MP Manoj Kotak will review the North East district, while MLAs Parag Alavani and Sanjay Upadhyay have been given charge of the North Central district. 

The South Central district will be reviewed by MLA Prasad Lad and former MLA Sunil Rane, while South Mumbai district will be reviewed by Minister Mangal Prabhat Lodha and Legislative Assembly Speaker Rahul Narwekar. 

Meanwhile, the BMC's election department is conducting ground visits to decide the boundaries of 227 electoral wards. The FPJ had reported earlier that due to new roads, storm water drains and other infrastructural developments in Mumbai since 2017, it is likely that there will be minor changes in the ward boundaries. After completing the eight step process, the BMC was earlier going to notify the ward delimitation on September 4.

However, in a politically charged move, the Maharashtra government involved of two secretaries of the UDD in drafting the electoral ward boundaries due to which the schedule for the final announcement of the wards got extended. The final ward delimitation notification is now expected between October 3 to 6.

This also leads to postponement of civic polls to November end.