Due for 2 years, Gurgaon civic polls to be held on March 2; counting on 12th

Gurgaon: Elections for the city's municipal corporations will be held on March 2, 27 months after the term of the previous MCG House ended.
The long-pending polls, announced by the state election commission on Tuesday, will see the city vote for the first time in two corporation areas – one in Gurgaon (MCG), and another formed in Manesar in 2020.
Five other municipal corporations in Haryana will also go to the polls on Mar 2 -- Faridabad, Hisar, Rohtak, Karnal and Yamunanagar. Elections for the Panipat civic body will be carried out on March 9.
Votes will be counted on March 12 and the results will be declared immediately after that, officials said.
State election commissioner Dhanpat Singh on Tuesday said the model code of conduct (MCC) is now in effect. No official connected with the election, or any employee of the municipal bodies shall be transferred from his/her present place of posting till the election is over, Singh said.
Across the state, 10,000 electronic voting machines, and 25,000 polling officials will be deployed for the exercise, the SEC said.
A lot has changed since 2017, when the last MCG House was elected.
The Gurgaon civic body's jurisdiction was revised in Dec 2020 to bring 16 villages under the corporation.
This also prompted a delimitation exercise to add the population of these villages and redraw boundaries of wards.
Delimitation, also delayed because of lack of Census data, was completed only last year after officials relied on information collected under the state's Parivar Pehchan Patra (PPP) scheme to issue family IDs.
Now, there are 36 wards in Gurgaon, higher in count by just one ward compared to the 2017 MCG House though the boundaries have been altered too. The latest list of voters is 8.9 lakh, an increase of 32,271 from the previous polls.
The Manesar corporation was formed in Dec 2020, but municipal polls have not been held there in over four years. A total of 96,687 voters will be eligible to cast their ballots for representatives to 20 wards under MCM next month.
The coming election will also be the first time that the city will directly vote for a mayor. The Haryana cabinet, in 2018, approved the new norm for residents to elect a mayor instead of councillors' making the choice till then.
Madhu Azad of BJP, a Scheduled Caste candidate, was chosen as the Gurgaon mayor in the 2017 civic polls. This time, the seat has been reserved for a woman from backward class-category.
The mayoral post in Manesar is up for grabs for a general category candidate.
City's civic crisis
In the two in-between years without an MCG House, the city has descended into crises of sanitation and waste management.
Heaps of garbage on roadsides, damaged and pothole-ridden roads, waterlogging and overflowing sewage aren't uncommon even though the ‘Millennium City' is touted as a hub of corporates and emerging startups.
Though councillors are not the ones to run the civic corporations, these elected representatives are tasked with bridging the gap with MCG departments headed by IAS and HCS officers
They collaborate with MCG officials and hold regular meetings, including that with the municipal commissioner, to address city-related concerns and ensure accountability.
"I am looking forward to having an MCG House. Elected representatives help in better planning and implementation of projects. We will work in coordination with them to ensure that the city functions smoothly and residents' issues are resolved," MCG commissioner Ashok Kumar Garg told TOI.
Former councillor Ravinder Yadav said the announcement of poll dates brings "respite" to officials and residents.
"The administrative staff of MCG is usually hesitant about undertaking projects after the end of councillors' tenure," Yadav said. The Gurgaon councillors' term ended on Nov 2, 2022.
Residents said they, too, were relieved.
"Local governance is important for a city's smooth functioning. MCG polls were long due. However, SEC should have considered the schedule of Class 10 and 12 Board exams before deciding the dates, as they consider for Lok Sabha and assembly elections," said Chaitali Mandhotra, a resident of Ardee City.
TOI had reported in Dec 2024 that the state govt was not keen on holding municipal polls before the assembly election. Sources had said that BJP's internal surveys suggested the party wouldn't perform well in civic bodies, and this could affect the state polls.
The party stormed back to power for a third straight term in Haryana last year, clearing the way for civic elections to be announced.