SEC grants stay on draw declaring reservation of wards on August 5

Aurangabad, Aug 4:

The Aurangabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) has stayed on the programme, to declare 50 per cent of seats for women candidates belonging to different categories, scheduled to be held tomorrow (August 5) at 11. The AMC deputy commissioner and head of the election branch Santosh Tengale confirmed the stay order.

Earlier, the AMC was in two minds over conducting the programme as the state cabinet meeting stayed the increase of members in the municipal corporations on Wednesday and decided to conduct the municipal corporation elections as per the old prabhag system in 2017. However, the AMC has not received any official order from the State Election Commission (SEC) till today evening.

The AMC will be conducting its general elections for the first time based on prabhags (one prabhag-multiple member). Each prabhag comprises of three wards. Hence, considering 126 wards (or 42 prabhags), the AMC was to declare reservation of 63 wards (50 per cent) for women candidates belonging to Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe, Other Backward Class and General (Open) etc.

According to the SEC sources,” The gazette regarding the decision taken in the cabinet meeting was received late in the evening. Hence there will be a stay on the draw which was scheduled to be held tomorrow (August 5).”