Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], January 15 : The polling for India's richest municipal corporation, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), began on Thursday early morning, with hundreds of voters queueing up to exercise their franchise and elect 277 new ward members, after a gap of nearly 8 years.
The last BMC election was held in February 2017. Currently, the posts of deputy mayor and mayor are vacant.
Voting began at 7:30 am today, with people queuing at their respective polling booths. A total of 1,700 candidates are set to contest the polls in Mumbai.
The Thackeray family, including former Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and his son Aaditya Thackeray, also visited polling booth 44 at Kala Nagar, Sahvas Society, in Bandra East to cast their votes.
Several Bollywood celebrities are expected to cast their votes, with Akshay Kumar arriving at his assigned booth early in the morning.
A total of 1,03,44,315 citizens are eligible to vote in the BMC polls. Of these, 55,16,707 are men, 48,26,509 are women, and the number of other voters is 1,099.
The State Election Commission (SEC) has strictly enforced the Model Code of Conduct (MCC), with thousands of personnel deployed for monitoring.
Apart from Mumbai, Municipal elections for over 28 other corporations are being held across Maharashtra, with counting of votes scheduled for Friday, January 16.
To ensure maximum voter participation, the Maharashtra government has declared January 15 a public holiday under the Negotiable Instruments Act. The holiday applies to all government and semi-government offices, corporations, and banks within the jurisdiction of the 29 corporations going to the polls.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is contesting the BMC elections in alliance with Eknath Shinde-led Shiv Sena. Meanwhile, the National Congress Party, which is part of Mahayuti in the state and the NDA in the Centre, has joined hands with the NCP (SP) in key municipal corporations, including Pimpri-Chinchwad and Pune.
On Wednesday, South Mumbai Returning Officer, Krishna Jadhav, highlighted how the SEC has set up teams to assist senior citizens and also set up various programs to encourage people to vote.
"We have a team in place that will assist senior citizens. They will take them to the voting compound. We encourage voters to come and cast their votes. We are making every effort to ensure this. For women, we have created pink booths. The pink polling station means that all the staff working at that booth will be women. The polling station will be decorated in pink, and the women working at that polling station will also wear pink sarees," Jadhav told ANI.
The state Election Commission also set up a voter awareness message ahead of the municipal elections, lighting up Mumbai's Bandra-Worli Sea Link.
The prominent civic bodies going to polls include Mumbai, Thane, Navi Mumbai, Ulhasnagar, Kalyan-Dombivli, Bhiwandi-Nizampur, Mira-Bhayandar, Vasai-Virar, Panvel, Nashik, Malegaon, Ahilyanagar, Jalgaon, Dhule, Pune, Pimpri-Chinchwad, Solapur, Kolhapur, Ichalkaranji, Sangli-Miraj-Kupwad, Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar, Nanded-Waghala, Parbhani, Jalna, Latur, Amravati, Akola, Nagpur and Chandrapur.