GHMC Mayor polls on February 11: BJP says it will field candidates

A day before the GHMC mayor and deputy mayor elections, the BJP has stated that it would field its candidates for the two top posts of the Hyderabad civic body.

On Thursday, the ward members elected in the December first week polls would take their oath and later chose the mayor and deputy mayor.

The TRS has 56, BJP 47 (excluding one member who died), AIMIM – 44, Congress – 2 councillors in the 150 ward Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation council.

With no party gaining a clear majority, the votes of 44 ex-officio members i.e., MPs, MLAs etc., would become crucial. 32 of these members are from the TRS; AIMIM has 10 and BJP 2.

While the quorum required for holding mayoral elections is 97, contesting parties need to gain a simple majority.

“Regardless of the outcome, we will field our candidates for both the posts. The overall difference between the votes gained by the TRS and us is only a few thousand. If AIMIM would be in fray or not is not our concern. The TRS-AMIMM are anyway friends,” said Ramchander Rao, senior T-BJP leader.

The term of the GHMC council is till February 10. However, elections were held two months in advance, which the BJP and other opposition parties had then alleged “is to favor the ruling the TRS.”

The municipal polls saw an unprecedented canvassing with the BJP involving its national leaders like Amit Shah and Yogi Adityanath. The TRS taunted the saffron party for the same and municipal administration minister KT Rama Rao dubbed the polls as “a gully vs Delhi, Gujarati rule fight.”

The short but intense 10-day campaign also witnessed blistering electioneering, with Telangana BJP chief Bandi Sanjay vowing to launch “surgical strikes” in the old city to flush out the illegally staying Rohingyas, Bangladeshis etc.

In a startling result, the TRS was reduced to 56 seats from the 99 seats that it had won in 2016. Analysts believe the TRS still has better chances to gain the mayor's seat, depending on the attendance in the house on Thursday.

Mayor post, this time around, is reserved for women.