Bengaluru, Sep 28 (IANS) : Ruling Congress' corporator R Sampath Raj was elected as the 51st mayor of the city's civic body through a Congress-Janata Dal (Secular) alliance in the polls held on Thursday.

"Congress corporator from DJ Halli ward R Sampath Raj was chosen as the new mayor in the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) elections," BBMP spokesman Suresh told IANS here.

JD(S) corporator Padmavathi Narasimhamurthy from Rajagopalnagar ward was elected as the Deputy Mayor.

"Out of a total of 266 voters, Congress and JD-S alliance gathered 139 votes while the BJP secured 126 votes," Suresh said.

R Sampath Raj

Raj defeated BJP's mayoral candidate S. Muniswamy, a corporator from Kadugudi ward with a majority of 13 votes.

This year's mayor post was reserved for Scheduled Caste candidate, the official said.

Although the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the city has more number of corporators, the Congress-JD(S) alliance denied the party from gathering any posts in the coveted mayoral polls for the third consecutive year.

Even as the BJP has a majority in the BBMP Council, with the votes of Members of Legislative Assembly, Members of Legislative Councils and Members of Parliament from the city, the Congress-JD(S) coalition's candidate has managed to emerge a winner.