Team Herald
PONDA: Marcaim Villagers expresses displeasure over Panchayat ward delimitation under banner of Marcaim Nagrik Kruti Sangh (MNKS). It filed objection with the Election Registration Officer (ERO) Mamlatdar and Joint Mamlatdar at Ponda. In its objection MNKS alleged the delimitation of panchayat wards as unconstitutional and unlawful and had demanded proper rectification and injustice to aspirants, wishing to contest the forthcoming election.
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Premanand Gaude President of (MNKS) said after delimitation the voters are uneven in each ward. In some wards the voters’ count is above 700 while in some ward there are only 360 voters. He said it is unconstitutional, unlawful and injustice to candidates contesting election. Marcaim has nine wards and there should be equal number of voters in each wards with minor difference, he claimed. “When we compared, there is a huge difference. One has 700 voters while the other has only 360. It’s wrong and certainly there is no level playing field for candidates contesting the elections,” said Gaude.
In the objection letter it pointed out out how delimitation is unconstitutional it mentioned the article 243 C(2) of Constitution of India mandated /obligated that ‘each panchayat area shall be divided into territorial constituencies in such a manner that the ration between the population of each constituency and the number of seats allotted to it shall as far as practicable be the same throughout the panchayat area.
Further it pointed out that the Section 7(3) of the Goa Panchayat Raj Act 1994 also mandated/obligate that ‘The Director shall divide each panchayat area into wards the number of which shall be equal to the number of members determined in respect of such panchayat under sub-section (1)’ but they argued that delimitation of ward of Marcaim doesn’t meet the mandate.
In ward 1 there are 573 voters, in ward 2 there are 527 voters, in ward 3 there are 360 voters, in ward 4 there are 446 voters, ward 5 has 717 voters, ward 6 has 674 voters, ward 7 has 628 voters, ward 8 has 649 voters and ward 9 has 700. Total number of voters in Marcaim is 5274.
According to Gaude as per provision of law average voters per ward should be total voters (5274) divided by number of 9 wards, which comes to 586 average voters per ward. In view of above, he requested authorities to rectify the delimitation of wards strictly as per article 243 and Section 7 of Panchayat Raj Act Goa.
