Congress accuses BJP of poaching ahead of Mayoral poll

Hectic last minute parleys were on in the Congress on finalising its candidate for the election of city Mayor scheduled for Friday even as the party accused the BJP of poaching two independent corporators supporting it and huddled five others in a resort.

KPCC President Dinesh Gundurao told reporters the Congress was still confident that the two corporators would support its candidate. With two independent corporators switching loyalties to BJP, the Congress went into a tizzy and deputed its MLAs S T Somashekhar and Munirathna to keep the five other independent corporators under their watch at the resort on the city outskirts.

We have with us all the independent corporators except for the two who are learnt to have gone to the rival side. We are confident that they will also come back, Somashekhar told PTI.

In the 2015 civic elections, BJP emerged as the single largest party in the Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) council winning 100 seats, followed by Congress with 75 and JDS 15 seats. The Congress and JDS came together and also had the support of seven independent corporators.

Under an agreement, Congress got the mayor post while JDS the deputy mayor when they came together to capture power. Though the term of the municipal council is of five years, the mayor and deputy mayor have a term of 11 months.

The term of present Mayor R Sampath Raj and Deputy Mayor Padmavathi Narasimhamurthy ended Thursday, necessitating the elections. The mayor and deputy mayors are elected by an electoral college comprising corporators and also MLAs, MLCs, MPs, who are voters in the city. The total votes required for a win is 130 out of the total 259. In the electoral college, BJP has 123 votes, Congress 106 votes, and JD(S) has 22 votes. There are eight independents.