Mumbai Hosts Elections Fit for Many Small Countries: Choudhury

Later this week, the city of Mumbai will witness a most unusual election: rambunctious, widely watched and keenly contested, even by India's feverish standards.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) of Mumbai is both the oldest such entity in India (it was set up in 1882) and the richest. It is in charge of public works -- road-building, water supply, sanitation, garbage collection, maintenance of parks and public spaces -- that affect the lives of the 20 million citizens of the nation's commercial capital, and one of the most densely populated (and some would say dystopian) metropolises in the world. Every five years the corporation holds elections for representatives from each of the city's 227 wards, which each have an average population of 45,000.