Mangaluru: Even as the issue of reservation for the 23rd Mayor of Mangaluru City Corporation is yet to be resolved, the State Government on Wednesday August 24 announced reservation for the post of Mayor and Deputy Mayor for the 24th term of the next year. As per State Government reservation post of Mayor and Deputy Mayor’s post will be reserved for General Women.
Currently Sumangala Rao is the Deputy Mayor and Premananda Shetty is the Mayor. 23rd reservation came last year. Last year, the Government had issued an order reserving the Mayor’s post for the 23rd term of the Mangaluru City Corporation for General and the Deputy Mayor’s post for Backward Class Women category. Accordingly, the Mayor and Deputy Mayor election was scheduled for March 2 but the Government did not hold the election as Rahul Ramesh of Maharashtra pointed out the issue of reservation in the local body when he filed a complaint in the Supreme Court in connection with another case.
Generally, the reservation of Mayor and Deputy Mayor of the respective year is announced by the Government in that year itself. However, there is a difference of one year between MCC and the rest of the State Corporations, so the election of Mayor and Deputy Mayor for the 23rd term of MCC will be held while the remaining corporations will get 24 terms this time. The Mayor and Deputy Mayor’s reservation was announced for MCC last year. The next year’s reservation was announced on Wednesday without the earlier term’s reservation being implemented this year.
Diwakar Pandeshwar was elevated to the throne in the first term of the BJP rule in the Corporation while Premananda Shetty was given the Mayor’s post after the general reservation was fixed for the second term. The third term of reservation announced by the government last year was fixed for a general candidate but elections were not held. Now that the fourth term of Mayor’s reservation has been fixed for a general candidate, it has triggered a widespread debate in the Corporation.
