According to archival records, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) was conceived by the policy-makers almost a decade after India’s independence and began its journey in April 1958 with 80 councillors.
According to old documents and reports obtained by PTI, and the views of several experts, the MCD was modeled on the ‘Bombay Municipal Corporation’, and was set up after amalgamating several local bodies and administrative committees.
The erstwhile unified MCD was bifurcated in 2011 and three new bodies came into existence in 2012 – North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC), South Delhi Municipal Corporation (SDMC) and East Delhi Municipal Corporation (EDMC), which merged into one. got integrated. Civil unit again in May 2022.
A fresh delimitation exercise was conducted in July after the Union Home Ministry constituted a three-member panel to redraw municipal wards in Delhi.
The central government then fixed the total number of seats in the MCD at 250 from the earlier figure of 272.
The civic body elections for 250 wards are to be held on December 4 and this is the first municipal election in Delhi after the fresh delimitation of wards.
The election is largely being seen as a triangular contest between the AAP, the BJP and the Congress. The BJP has been in power in the civic body since 2007 when the MCD was a unified body. The Municipal Corporation of Delhi came into existence under the Municipal Corporation of Delhi Act, 1957.
According to archival records, there were 80 councilors in 1957, and through successive delimitations, the number of wards was increased to 134 and eventually to 272 in 2007. After bifurcation, NDMC and SDMC had 104 wards, while EDMC had 64. The three municipal bodies were integrated into the MCD earlier this year.
According to the words of the DMC Act 1957, “the municipal government of Delhi was being administered in accordance with the provisions of the Punjab District Board Act, 1883 (2 of 1883) and the Punjab Municipal Act, 1911 (3 of 1911)”.
To run the municipal affairs of Delhi, there were various bodies and local authorities including Municipal Committee, Delhi; Notified Area Committee, Civil Station; Notified Area Committee, Red Fort; Municipal Committee, Delhi-Shahdara; Municipal Committee, West Delhi; Municipality, South Delhi; Notified Area Committee, Mehrauli; Notified Area Committee, Najafgarh; and Notified Area Committee, Narela, it said.
Other local bodies include District Board, Delhi; Delhi State Electricity Board; Delhi Road Transport Authority; and the Delhi Joint Water and Sewage Board, said the Act.
“With so many bodies and local authorities looking after the municipal affairs, complexities and problems were being faced by the various authorities as well as the public. A need was felt for a unified body to administer the municipal government of Delhi . Accordingly, to consolidate and amend the laws relating to the municipal government of Delhi, the Delhi Municipal Corporation Bill was introduced in Parliament,” it said.
On December 28, 1957, the President gave his assent to the Delhi Municipal Corporation Bill passed by both the Houses of the Parliament.
The MCD thus came into being in 1958 when Delhi got its first mayor, evolving from the municipal administration system that began around 1860. The newly formed civic body was headquartered in the historic Town Hall, a nearly 160-year-old iconic building in the Chandni Chowk area, which also housed the erstwhile Delhi Municipality, and where the MCD remained until the late 2000s. Moving base for the imposing 28-storey high Civic Center opposite the New Delhi Railway Station.
The Lutyens’ Delhi area and Delhi Cantonment areas governed by the New Delhi Municipal Committee (later New Delhi Municipal Council) were excluded from the purview of the new corporation.
As Delhi now has a unified municipal corporation and will soon again have a mayor for the entire city after a gap of 10 years, several constitutional experts recalled the inception and journey of the erstwhile MCD, which they said was was a “very powerful body”. A “very powerful mayor”.
Old documents and archival reports, relating to the period when the MCD was being conceptualized after merging several existing local bodies, mention that it was modeled after the Bombay Municipal Corporation or BMC (now the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation). Which was established by the British. To administer the then Bombay Presidency in the late 19th century.
Earlier this year, soon after the proposed re-unification of the three corporations, former Delhi chief secretary and former state election commissioner Rakesh Mehta had said, “The MCD already has the infrastructure, all the councilors at the civic center There is a house to accommodate. A place, and the mayor will also have a greater stature, being the first citizen of the city, as it was pre-trifurcation”.
A senior official said, “In the unified era of the MCD, the mayor was the number one citizen of Delhi and a mayor received foreign dignitaries at the airport and civic reception at the Red Fort or Ramlila Maidan.”
Delhi Transport Undertaking (later Delhi Transport Corporation), Delhi Jal Board and some other units were also under the erstwhile MCD.
read all latest politics news Here