The local body elections slated for October will be significant in many ways for Chennai.
It will be the first local election in the city after its expansion from the 174 sq. km under the city corporation to Greater Chennai that covers 426 sq. km.
With the expansion of the city's boundaries, and the resultant increase in the number of wards and zones, the ward strength in the council will go up from the existing 155 to 200.
If the government chooses to conduct a direct election to the mayor's post, it will be a referendum of the people with an electorate of nearly six million - as many people as would vote to elect five MPs or 30 MLAs - choosing a mayor for the first time in the state.
The previous DMK regime had ordered the expansion of Chennai and creation a larger urban agglomeration on the lines of Greater Bengaluru and Greater Hyderabad after consultations on the development of outlying areas of the city.
The AIADMK government has decided not to reverse the order, official sources said. The government will promulgate legislation to give effect to the decision.
As many as nine municipalities, including Ambattur, Alandur, Maduravoyal, Manali and Tiruvottiyur, eight town panchayats, including Puzhal, Porur, Meenambakkam, Perungudi and Sholinganallur, and 25 village panchayats in Tiruvallur and Kanchipuram districts have been brought under the Greater Chennai Corporation limits, raising the city's population to nearly 60 lakh from the present 43 lakh.
The city limits will expand up to Uthandi on East Coast Road, Sholinganallur on the IT corridor, Kathivakkam and Madhavaram in the north, and up to Meenambakkam in the south.
Sources said the government had completed the delimitation exercise for the wards with newly redrawn boundaries.
The population of each ward will be approximately 40,000 in the core city (existing corporation limits), around 30,000 in immediate peripheries and 20,000 in the boundaries.
The authorities have shelved plans to create two more municipal corporations headquartered at Tambaram and Avadi at the northern and southern ends of the city to cover the suburbs.
