Chennai: Election fever is in Tamil Nadu slowly spreading across verticvals as the state prepares for the Urban Local Body elections, with authorities preparing for the event and political parties beginning the process of selecting candidates to run for various positions in the 21 Corporations, 138 Municipalities, and 490 Town Panchayats.
Voters will choose their respective ward members and councillors, who will then choose the chairpersons for the town panchayats and municipalities, as well as the Mayors for the Corporations, because the old system of holding indirect elections will be followed in the polls, which are expected to be held in the second week of February.
The overwhelming demand of all political parties who attended a preliminary level meeting organised by the State Election Commission (SEC) at its office in Chennai was to hold elections for all urban local bodies on a single day.
State Election Commissioner V Palanikumar presided over the meeting, which included representatives from recognised political parties. Senior officials from the SEC and Chennai Corporation Commissioner Gagandeep Singh Bedi also attended. Palanikumar told the conference that the Commission was completely prepared to hold the election at any time and had completed all required preparations.
The ruling DMK has started the selection process to district office-bearers, who will also interact with alliance partners on a local level to finalise seat distribution and allocation. Others, such as the AIADMK, Congress, and BJP, have begun to receive applications from hopefuls, though the new announcement on ward reservation may affect the nature of the applicants, since some would be seeking interest for the first time.
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