What is the story about?
Mumbai recorded a voter turnout of 29.96% till 1:30 pm on Thursday, January 15, as polling continued for the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC).
Counting of votes is scheduled to begin at 10 am on Friday, January 16.
Voting is underway from 7:30 am to 5:30 pm on January 15 for the BMC and 28 other municipal corporations across Maharashtra.
BMC voter turnout (%) over the years
1992 | ████████████████████ 49.14
1997 | ██████████████████ 44.36
2002 | ████████████████ 42.05
2007 | ███████████████████ 46.05
2012 | ██████████████████ 44.75
2017 | ████████████████████████ 55.28
The BMC contest is being closely watched as a high-stakes battle between the BJP-led Mahayuti alliance and the united Thackeray camp for control of the country’s richest civic body.
According to PTI, the counting of votes for the BMC elections will begin at 10 am on Friday, civic commissioner Bhushan Gagrani said.
“Due to the short gap between polling and counting, the counting of votes for all civic wards will start at 10 am on Friday. It may take an hour longer than usual,” Gagrani said.
Polling is being held for 2,869 seats across 893 wards in the 29 municipal corporations, with around 3.48 crore voters set to decide the fate of 15,931 candidates. Of these, 1,700 candidates are contesting in Mumbai and 1,166 in Pune.
The BMC election marks the Shiv Sena’s first civic poll since its 2022 split, when Eknath Shinde broke away with a majority of MLAs, retaining the party’s name and symbol. The undivided Shiv Sena had controlled the BMC for 25 years.
Except for Mumbai, all other 28 municipal corporations have multi-member wards. The civic polls are being held after a gap of more than six years, as the terms of these bodies ended between 2020 and 2023. Nine of the 29 corporations are located in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), India’s most urbanised belt.
Voter turnout in previous BMC elections stood at 49.14 per cent in 1992, 44.36 per cent in 1997, 42.05 per cent in 2002, 46.05 per cent in 2007, 44.75 per cent in 2012 and 55.28 per cent in 2017.
More than 25,000 police personnel have been deployed in Mumbai to oversee polling and counting.
