MUZAFFARGARH, Nov 1: The total number of union councils has increased to 116 after the addition of 23 more to the already 93 UCs following the completion of the delimitation process in Muzaffargarh district.

Sources said the district government had also abolished town committees and made four municipal committees in Jatoi, Alipur, Kot Addu and Muzaffargarh tehsils.

According to a delimitation law, each union council would have 10,000 to 15,000 people, but some UCs in Jatoi tehsil had over 20,000 souls, a source said.

He said Dera Commissioner Chaudhry Amin had inducted local PML-N leaders into the committees formed for the delimitation process in the district.

In Muzaffargarh tehsil, the committee members were PML-N MPA Hammad Nawaz Tipu and former PML-N ticket-holder Sardar Abad Dogar; in Jatoi tehsil, PML-N MNA Syed Basit Sultan Bukhari, in Kot Addu tehsil, PML-N MPA Ahmad Yar Hunjra and in Alipur tehsil, PML-N MPA Amir Talal Gopang, he said.

He claimed that earlier the Muzaffargarh district had five town committees in Shehr Sultan, Daira Din Panah, Chowk Sarwar Shaheed, Khangarh and Sanawan which had been abolished and now each tehsil had one municipal committee.

He said he and some other people had moved the commissioner’s court against the delimitations process pleading that 93 UCs should have been double after the delimitation process.

Giving an example of Rajanpur district, ‘we have pleaded that it had 34 union councils but after the delimitation process the number of UCs has now increased to 68.’

Local PPP leaders alleged that committees’ members, mostly PML-N leaders, had included their favourite mauzas and villages in union councils which would badly hit them in the local body elections.

DCO Farasat Iqbal claimed that the delimitation process was completed transparently, adding he had received some objections-related applications which were sent to the Dera commissioner.

After hearing objections, he said the final list of union councils would be available on Saturday (today).