Pune officially becomes biggest city in Maharashtra; Advantage for NCP?
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Pune, July 1: Ahead of civic elections, Pune officially has become the city with the largest geographical area in Maharashtra after an order was issued for extending the boundaries of Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) to include 23 new villages in the existing city limits.
The PMC will now have a geographical area of 516.18 sq km, thus replacing the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), which has 440 sq km area, as the civic body with the largest area. With the new urban limits, Pune also becomes the seventh-largest city in the country.
Incidentally, the PMC has an estimated budget of Rs 8,370 crore for 2021-22, as compared to the Rs 39,038 crore budget of the BMC. The state Urban Development department had issued the notification on December 23 last year announcing its intention to extend PMC boundaries to include the new areas. “The state government has considered the objections and suggestions received to the notification,” the order stated, adding that the government has decided to alter the limits of the civic body.
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The 23 adjoining villages merged in PMC limits are Mhalunge, Sus, Bavdhan Budruk, Kirkatwadi, Pisoli, Kondhwe-Dhawade, Kopre, Nanded, Khadakwasla, Manjari Budhruk, Narhe, Holkarwadi, Autade-Handewadi, Wadachiwadi, Shewalewadi, Nandoshi, Sanasnagar, Mangdewadi, Bhilarewadi, Gujar Nimbalkarwadi, Jambhulwadi, Kolewadi and Wagholi.
The state government had first declared its intention to include 34 villages in PMC limits in 2014, but the process was delayed and only 11 villages were merged in the PMC, that too after an intervention by the Bombay High Court in 2017. The High Court had urged the state government for a response over its delay in merging the villages in PMC limits, after the villagers approached the court.
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The 11 villages merged in 2017 were Lohegaon, Mundhwa, Hadapsar, Uttamnagar, Shivane, Ambegaon Khurd, Undri, Dhayari, Ambegaon Budruk, Phursungi and Urli Devachi.
While the NCP and deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar were keen to merge these villages ahead of civic elections scheduled in February 2022, the BJP demanded the process to be done in parts. On Tuesday, a day before the state government issued a final notification, Pawar met representatives from various departments and asked them to hand over various offices and amenities to PMC, which is governed by the urban development department.
It should be noted that PMC is run by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) with 98 members even as NCP is preparing to wrest it back in the upcoming elections. As per the Maharashtra Municipal Corporation Act, a municipal corporation with a population of over 2.4 million in its area needs to have a minimum of 145 elected corporators. Pune currently has 165 and the latest merger may increase the count to up to 175.