Manjunath Reddy is new Bengaluru Mayor

Bengaluru, Sep 11: B N Manjunath Reddy of the Congress has been elected as the new Mayor of Bengaluru.

He won the Mayoral polls with 131 seats which is exactly the magic number to form the council at the BBMP. The post of Deputy Mayor went to Hemalatha Gopalaiah who is from the JD(S).

The Congress and the JD(S) came together to form the council despite the BJP having the largest mandate in the elections that concluded recently. With this result the council is now formed by the Congress and JD(S) combine.

The two parties will now discuss the posts to be shared to the standing committees of the BBMP.

The results of the BBMP council election is however subject to a writ petition pending before the Karnataka High Court. The BJP had questioned the voting rights of the MLA's, MLC's and the MPs in the elections.

The court after hearing the matter stated that the results of the mayoral polls will be subject to the result of the writ petition pending before it.

Meanwhile members of the BJP's Yuva Morcha staged a protest outside the corporation office. The protestors had questioned the Congress-JD(S) combine and termed it unethical.

The Yuva Morcha members say that the Congress and the JD(S) do not have the right to form the council especially when the BJP had been given the mandate by the people of Bengaluru. Several persons have been detained by the police following the protests.

The BJP with 101 seats had fallen short by three to form the council. While the Congress and JD(S) combine mustered up 131 seats with the help of the elected representatives, the BJP could manage only 128.

There was high drama ahead of the elections. Most of the corporators were shifted to resorts in a bid to avoid horse trading. While the JD(S) corporators were brought for the elections from a resort in Kerala, the Congress councilors were transported to Bengaluru from a resort in Kodagu.

OneIndia News