Goemkarponn desk
PANAJI: General Elections to Ponda and Sanquelim Municipal Councils will be held tomorrow from 8 am to 5 pm.
The voting for the two councils will take place on May 5, and the counting and declaration of results will be on May 7.
The term of the existing council of Ponda and Sanquelim Municipality will expire on May 20th.
Ponda Municipal Council has 16,305 voters – 8,152 males and 8,153 females, while Sanquelim Municipal Council has 8,640 voters – 4239 males and 4401 females.
The number of wards for the Ponda Municipal Council is 15 and the number of wards for Sanquelim Municipal Council is 12.
Municipal polls are not held on party lines in the state; however, the parties field ‘panels’ of candidates and later claim victory depending on the winning candidates.
The Sanquelim Municipal Council is currently controlled by a panel backed by the opposition Congress.
Ponda, on the other hand, is a municipality where the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and its alliance partner, the Maharashtrawadi Gomantak Party, are local rivals and are likely to field separate panels for the polls.
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) claimed three of these four elected unopposed were affiliated to it.
In Ponda, Vishwanath Dalvi, a senior BJP functionary, earned his third innings in the civic body after the lone candidate against him in Ward no. 7, Bharat Purohit, withdrew his nomination.
In ward no. 13, too, one candidate Darshana Naik withdrew her nomination. Thus Vidhya Punalekar was elected unopposed, and she later formally joined the BJP.
It was also informed that the district collectors had been appointed as municipal council election officers. In contrast, the deputy collector/SDM of Ponda and Bicholim talukas have been selected as returning officers.
The mamlatdars of Ponda and Bicholim talukas have been appointed as assistant returning officers.
The election commissioner also informed that the commission has appointed general observers and expenditure observers.
Also, the district collectors shall appoint flying squads to monitor the enforcement of the poll code.
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