Saroor

Jammu, Sept 06: Following reshuffling and reservation of wards, contesting will not be a cakewalk for the big names and the stalwarts in upcoming municipal polls.

Official sources in the Jammu Municipal Corporation said that the draft reservation issued for the Municipal Corporation elections has upset the political equations of several bigwigs from different political outfits.

“The wards from which they had earlier won the election have been reserved and now they have to try their luck from separate wards,” they said.

Sources added that the wards of Mayor and Deputy Mayor have also been reserved and they now have to be fielded from separate wards to win the municipal polls, adding, “out of 75 wards, 25 have been reserved for women, 10 for Scheduled Castes and two for Scheduled Tribes.”

Sitting Mayor Rajendra Sharma’s ward number 16 has been reserved for general women, while deputy mayor’s ward number 56 has been reserved for SC women, they added.

Sources revealed that they both have to look for an alternate ward to contest the elections, adding, “similarly, the ward number 19 of Amit Gupta, Surendra Chaudhary of ward number 29, Sanjay Baru of ward number 41 has also been reserved for SC women.”

Sources said that Ashok Singh’s ward number 59 and Shauvat Ali’s ward number 74 were falling in the open category in the last elections but this time it has been reserved for women. In upcoming municipal elections the seats reserved for general category in the year 2018 have been reserved for SC and ST candidates.

Similarly, wards number 12 and 18 are reserved for general women while ward number 18 has also been reserved for general women.

Dinesh Sharma earlier contested from ward in the last elections while Pritam Singh’s ward number 55 has also been reserved to general women category.

They further said that three wards in Khour have been reserved for three SC women.

In the reservation list issued for the civic elections, out of 13 wards of Khour, seven have been reserved for open comprising three for women and three for SC category wherein around 6571 voters of Napa Khour will cast their vote.

Simultaneously, out of seven wards of Jourian Napa, three have been reserved and among these, ward one is reserved for SC women, three reserved for open women category and five wards are reserved for SC category.

Wards two, four, six and seven will be for open category and a total of 3240 voters will vote this time, they said.

Sources added that in Akhnoor corporation there are a total of 13 wards and in 2018 elections, 11 BJP councilors won and two Congress councilors won the seats.

But in 2019, when former minister Sham Lal Sharma joined BJP, both the Congress councilors from Akhnoor Municipality also joined BJP and all 13 councilors in Akhnoor Municipality were from the BJP.

“As the civic elections are approaching nearer, on one hand BJP has to fight to secure its ‘dying ship’ and simultaneously Congress has to fight for survival in Akhnoor Municipality.”

“Upcoming civic body polls are going to be exciting this time with major reshuffle and reservation of wards in the Akhnoor Municipality, and many sitting councilors have been reserved for the same,” they added.

Reservation of wards

SC: Ward No. 19, 29, 41, 45, 56, 57, 59, 65, 67, 74

SC Female: Ward No. 29, 56, 65

ST: Ward No. 60, 63

ST Female: Ward No. 63

Female category (General): Ward No. 2, 5, 8, 12, 16, 18, 23, 26, 32, 36, 39, 40, 43, 46, 49, 52, 55, 61, 66, 72, 73