Lucknow: The Uttar Pradesh government has released the reservation list for the position of mayors and chairpersons of the urban local bodies in the state.

Residents of Lucknow, Kanpur, and Ghaziabad are going to elect a woman mayor once again as for the second consecutive time, the mayoral positions in these cities have been reserved for women.

Overall, six out of 17 mayoral positions have been earmarked for women candidates. Eight out of the 17 mayoral positions have been left unreserved (Ayodhya, Mathura-Vrindavan, Gorakhpur, Moradabad, Bareilly, Aligarh, Prayagraj, and Varanasi).

Agra municipal corporation has been reserved for SC women, while Shahjahanpur and Firozabad cities have been reserved for OBC women. Jhansi will get an SC mayor while Saharanpur and Meerut cities will have OBC mayors governing the local municipal corporations.

A total of 760 individuals, who will head the 17 nagar nigams (municipal corporations), 199 nagar palikas (municipal councils), and 544 nagar panchayats (town councils), are going to be elected through the upcoming local body polls. All the political parties in the state are going to prepare their strategy based on the amended reservation list.

Urban development Minister A.K. Sharma said that recommendations of the dedicated backward classes commission have been implemented by the state government through the latest reservation list.

While the overall reservation for the OBC community has been capped at 27 percent like the last time, the state government will give higher representation as overall 288 seats out of the 760 have been reserved for women candidates (including general, OBC, SC, and ST communities).

Last time, when the state had announced the reservation before the commission had ascertained the political backwardness of the OBCs, the state on December 5 had reserved 255 seats for women candidates. “As a result, the proportion of the women candidates who will contest in the local body polls will go up from 33 percent to 38 percent,” said an officer.

The seats allocated to OBC candidates will remain the same as 205 positions (including women OBC reservation) are going to be offered to the community members. Similarly, key positions for SC candidates have been increased from 102 to 110 while those for STs have been increased to 2 from earlier 1.