Gerrymandering Maharashtra

The Delimitation Report of the Election Commission has been approved by the President of India. So the news is abuzz with the redistricting of constituencies for the next Central as well as State elections. The delimitation has brought forward some interesting aspects of the redrawing of lines!

To begin with, Maharashtra State Legislature has 288 seats. The total number of seats has been retained and redrawing has happened based on population density. It was decided in 1976, that the total number of seats will not be reviewed until 2026! Go figure!

Major urban areas such as Suburban Mumbai district, neighboring Navi Mumbai, Thane, Panvel and Pune and Nasik have undergone significant change in redrawing. With the exception of Mumbai District, these areas have seen significant increase in the number of representatives.

Thane is up from 13 to 24, Pune from 18 to 21 and Greater Mumbai holds the same number of seats, but share of suburbs has gone up to 17 but the city lost 10 seats. Nasik and Nagpur have also made modest gains.

The redistribution could be hardly representative. The population of Maharashtra has gone up significantly, but the proportion of people to representatives hasn’t changed. Only now, the urban areas will have better say in the formation of governments.

As the gerrymandering can show, the redistricting has followed major population growth areas. The cities – Greater Mumbai (and adjoining metropolitan area), Pune, Nasik, Nagpur are bursting at seams. One look from the top of the suburban train bridge at any local station shows the overwhelming display of the sprawl and decay. For all the increase in population, if we are also going to get more number of representatives, then in a saner world, we would have called it as victory of democracy and more power to people and other such clichés. But reality is going to be different. More number of representatives would only mean more birthday celebrations, more money laundering and less work. Call me a negative thinker if you will.

Unfortunately, with gerrymandering or without gerrymandering, the problems persist. When the Samyukta Maharashtra Movement created the separate state, major political weight was distributed between Mumbai and six districts of Western Maharashtra. The Western Maharashtra has been able to retain control over the policies through their clout and has converted itself into big-moneyed politicians and sugar barons. For all the progress that Maharashtra has made, little has been contributed to urban development. In the past 47 odd years of state’s existence, only one Chief Minister was from Mumbai and he too did not do great things for the city. The visionaries like Yashwant Chavan and Vasant Naik may have inadvertently done more harm to Mumbai than anyone will agree.

The resurging development following the liberalization was rampant and unplanned. Now that the political weight is changing to urban areas, do we hope to see any respite?

p.s. Thane by election result is in. Anand Paranjape of Shiv Sena won the election, in which the voter turnout was dismal. It is shame that both the parties contesting this seat had to look for the sons of the politicians to contest the seat. In the area, what Shiv Sena considers as its stronghold, there was no second-level leader who could take Prakash Paranjape’s place after his death. That speaks for the party!