Bengaluru: B N Manjunath Reddy, the councillor from Madiwala was elected Mayor, after Congress won 131 votes in the mayoral polls. Hemalatha Gopalaiah of the JD(S) will be the Deputy Mayor.
Hectic parleys on the eve of Bengaluru mayoral poll saw the Congress and JD(S) thrash out details of power sharing within the urban civic body.
The BJP had won 100 wards out of 198 in the polls held on August 22. Congress had bagged 76, JD (S) bagged 14 and others eight.
Senior BJP leaders including Ananth Kumar, Suresh Kumar, Ashoka, Ashwath Narayan and Venkiah Naidu walked out of Council hall after casting their votes.
Union Minister Ananth kumar said Congress had behaved in a very undemocratic way. “They have respected people’s wishes. This is a setback for democracy.” he added
Cong, JD(S) have edge in City mayor poll
Bengaluru : Hectic parleys on the eve of Bengaluru mayoral polls saw the Congress and JD(S) thrash out details of power sharing arrangements within the urban civic body.
The JD(S) not only convinced the Congress to leave the deputy mayor’s post, but also managed to get additional members in the Town Planning Improvement and Major Public Works Committees.
After heavy bargaining, it was decided that of the 12 posts of standing committee chairpersons, seven would be held by Independents, three by Congress, and two by the JD(S).
The Congress held a series of meetings to finalise its mayoral candidate on Thursday. While Transport Minister Ramalinga Reddy sided with Manjunath Reddy (BTM Layout), Food and Civil Supplies Minister Dinesh Gundu Rao pitched for Sathyanarayana (Gandhinagar).
MLA B A Basavaraj and MLC Byrathi Suresh rooted for Uday Kumar Reddy (Whitefield). The party finally agreed on Manjunath Reddy.
The JD(S) will field S P Hemalatha for the deputy mayor’s post, which is reserved for women. While the father-son duo of H D Deve Gowda and H D Kumaraswamy operated from behind the scenes, second line leaders Zameer Ahmed Khan, Akhanda Srinivasamurthy, K Gopalaiah and T A Saravana met Ramalinga Reddy and Dinesh Gundu Rao, following the advice of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah. Congress and JD(S) corporators-elect, including the independents, were ferried back to the City on Thursday from resorts in Madikeri and Kerala. The parties also issued a whip.
The BJP kept its fingers crossed by banking on “absentees” in the Congress-JD(S)-independents combine to scrape through the number-game.
The party will announce mayoral candidate on Friday morning. Padmanabha Reddy (Kacharakanahalli), Manjunath Raju (Kadu Malleshwara), L Srinivas (Kumaraswamy Layout) and N Nagaraj (Byrasandra) have emerged as the front-runners. The BJP is likely to nominate H C Nagarathna Ramamurthy (Pattabhiramanagar) as its deputy mayoral candidate.
The Congress and the JD(S) have renewed their ties after nearly a decade. They had formed an alliance after the 2004 Assembly polls threw a hung verdict.