Mayoral poll: Legality of election questioned

The election to the posts of Mayor and Deputy Mayor, conducted by Regional Commissioner Harsh Gupta, took place on Tuesday in the backdrop of a few members of the electoral college questioning the legality of the process. The election to four Standing Committees — Taxation and Finance, Health, Accounts and Markets — that was to be held was put off as no councillor filed nominations for the posts.

With the support of five Independent councillors and disqualification of five MLAs from the city — Byrathi Basavaraj, Munirathna, S.T. Somashekhar, Roshan Baig, and Gopalaiah — the BJP had the numbers to clinch the top posts. The strength of the electoral college stood at 257. Eight members, including Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Rajya Sabha MPs Jairam Ramesh and K.C. Ramamurthy, Lok Sabha MP D.K. Suresh, MLCs Raghu Achar, Puttanna, and K.V. Narayanaswamy were absent. The remaining 249 members cast their vote in the contentious election. While Mr. Kumar secured 129 out of 249 votes, Dattatreya Temple councillor and former ruling party leader R.S. Sathyanarayana, who was the candidate from the Congress-JD(S) alliance, bagged 112 votes.

Four candidates had filed their nominations for the post of Deputy Mayor. Gangamma Rajanna was the Congress-JD(S) candidate. Three councillors from BJP — Mahalakshmi H. Ravindra, C.R. Ramamohan Raju and Gurumurthy Reddy — filed their nominations. The BJP high command managed to convince Mr. Gurumurthy Reddy and Ms. Ravindra to withdraw their nominations. While Ms. Rajanna secured 116 votes, Mr. Raju secured 129 votes.

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