Reservation of Mayoral Posts to Be Finalised Through Lottery

Mumbai:Reservation for the posts of mayor in Maharashtra's 29 municipal corporations will be decided through a lottery system. Under the existing rules, 50 per cent of mayoral posts are reserved for women, including those from the Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) categories.

Although results for all 29 municipal corporations are expected to be declared by midnight, the election of mayors in each civic body will take place 10 to 12 days later, a senior official from the Urban Development Department (UDD) said.

The official said the UDD is currently collecting data from the respective municipal corporations on previous mayors and their reservation categories to determine the rotation.

Officials said the role of the State Election Commission (SEC) ends with the declaration of results, which are being announced directly by the Returning Officers of the respective wards. “The municipal commissioner of each civic body will publish an official gazette of the elected representatives within the next two to three days. Copies of the gazette will then be sent to the UDD, which will conduct the lottery to decide the reservation,” an official said.

Once the lottery is drawn, the divisional commissioner will convene meetings in the respective municipal corporations — except the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC)—to conduct the mayoral elections. “Nominations for the mayor’s election will be filed three days before the meeting is convened,” the senior official said.

In the case of the BMC, the first meeting for the election of the mayor will be convened by the incumbent municipal commissioner, Bhushan Gagrani, officials said.

Reservation of mayoral posts will be decided based on the proportion of Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe and Other Backward Class populations in the state, using data from the 2011 Census.