Apprehension ahead of delimitation

Coimbatore: Close to half of the city's wards are all set to get trimmed in the ongoing delimitation exercise carried out by the corporation. The boundaries of the 100 wards that are divided into five zones will be re-drawn. Wards with higher population may be split into two or three wards and wards with lower population will get bigger. The exercise is being carried out based on the 2011 census.

"The population of Coimbatore, as per the census, is 15,84,719. So, we have been asked to divide it equally, which means each ward should have a minimum population of 15,847 with a maximum deviation of 10%. It is very difficult to arrive at it, but we are confident of completing it as per norms laid out by the government," said a corporation official.

The first phase of delimitation exercise will be over by November-end after which the report will be submitted to the district collector.

The exercise may seem easy on paper, but the corporation is facing more than one challenge. While on the one hand the officials need to ensure that the wards of a particular zone remain in the same zone, political pressure is taking a toll on them. For example, in the west zone alone, ward number 23 has a population of 8,799 and it belongs to Thondamuthur constituency of rural administration minister SP Velumani. The nearby ward 22, with a population of 19,298, comes under Coimbatore South that belongs to MLA Amman Arjunan. Also, each of the ward councillors won with a margin of 5,000-10,000 votes, which may define their fate in the upcoming local body elections.

C Natarajan, former AIADMK councillor of ward 41, said that covers areas such as Maniyakarapaluyam, Ganapathy, Bharathi Nagar, Police quarters, Ganapathy Maa Nagar and Gandhi maa nagar is the largest ward with a population of 49,138. "There are 200 residential colonies in my ward. They may split my ward into three. But, I am okay with it. It is better that the population is lesser as I will be answerable to lesser number of people. It will also reduces grass-root level work. Also, whether a ward has a population of 5,000 or 50,000, the funds that we received is the same. The fund allocation will be even and it will help us develop the ward in a better manner," he told TOI. Each ward gets funds from the zonal committee and also from the corporation every month.

While AIADMK councillors are comfortable about the exercise, it is the opposition party councillors, who are nervous about it. "The officials will re-draw boundaries based on the recommendations of the ruling party cadres and our suggestions will not be accepted. The areas with people who support DMK party, who were our vote bank, will be removed from our wards and added to their wards in such a way that we lose their votes and they are not affected much," said former DMK councillor SM Samy.

However, corporation officials said that the entire process was only on paper and will not affect people in anyway. "Our officials are facing huge challenges as they have to visit each household for verification. Apart from that, the entire administration at ward-level, zone-level and city-level will change. Those who were paying their taxes in the west zone may now have to pay them at south zone or central zone office. Also, the ward offices, from where they collected birth and death certificates will also change. Services such as solid waste management and revenue collection will have to be re-worked to suit the new boundaries," said a senior corporation official.