Task cut out for BJP in Maximum City

With the Mahayuti alliance wresting control of India’s richest civic body, it now needs to deliver on the promises it made to each section of the economic strata. Shreyas Ubgade writes

- Shreyas Ubgade writes

Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis at an event to celebrate the BJP's victory in the state's municipal corporation polls

(PHOTO: PTI)

Addressing a rally while campaigning for elections to the 29 municipal corporations in Maharashtra, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said infrastructure works worth nearly %2 trillion were underway across the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR) — one of the most urbanised belts in India with 9 municipal corporations.

In the results that came in on January 16, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), along with allies, won the country’s richest civic body, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) — effectively ending a three-decade run by the Thackeray family, despite cousins Uddhav and Raj joining hands after sparring for two decades in a bid to consolidate the Marathi votes.

Apart from BMC, the BJP-led Mahayuti also commands a majority in 22 other civic bodies.

According to some experts, the helming of the BMC by a national political party that is also in power at the Centre may fast-track execution of big-ticket infrastructure projects.

“Urban areas contribute overwhelmingly to the national income: About 6§ per cent. The commissioners for the MMRDA and the BMC are generally handpicked by the CM. When there are different power centres at the BMC and the state level, the natural reflex of the bureaucracy is to stall and procrastinate. The moment big projects get postponed, there is cost escalation. Now, with the same party at the Centre, state, and the BMC, the government will be able to negotiate with the multilateral agencies to get loans for mega projects in the MMR,” says Abhay Pethe, former economics professor at the University of Mumbai and senior fellow at the Pune International Centre.