R Shanthamma, a member of a civic worker’s family, has been elected as a member of the Mysuru City Corporation (MCC). Shantamma’s mother-in-law is working as a civic worker with the MCC for last 15 years.
Shanthamma has been elected as a BJP Corporator from Ward 62, Vishveshwara Nagar, in the city. The ward was reserved for Scheduled Caste Woman. The Congress also had fielded a member of a civic worker’s family, K Nagarathna, from the same ward. Nagarathna, a resident of D Devaraj Urs Colony, is the sister of pourakarmika leader Palaniswami, while her husband P Manjunath is a Group ‘D’ employee in the MCC.
This time, five persons from the pourakarmika community had contested the elections to the MCC, held on August 31. The results were declared on September 3. While the BJP had fielded three persons, Congress and JD(S) had fielded one each. The other candidates were H S Vasanti of the JD(S) from ward 63 (J P Nagar), R Pooja from ward 32 (Ghousia Nagar) and R Subramanya from Ward 39 (Gayatripuram First Stage) of the BJP.
Vasanti’s husband S Nagaraj is a pourakarmika community leader and her in-laws are working as pourakarmikas. She is a resident of Navodaya Layout. Pooja is a resident of Pourakarmika Colony, in the city, and her father P Rangaswamy is a temporary civic worker in the MCC. Subramanya, who worked as a civic worker for 32 years, quit the job recently. He is now involved in social service. His parents too are pourakarmikas.
The only other person from the community, who was elected as a Corporator since the MCC was formed, in 1983 from the earlier City Municipality, is Narayan who was elected in 1996. Later, he went on to become the Mayor. Subsequently, he was also made the chairman of State Safai Karmachari Commission by the earlier Siddaramaiah government.
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