Pic: Vinay Pais
Daijiworld Media Network - Kundapur (SP)

Kundapur, Sep 5: Jyoti Putran from the backward class (A) was elected as the president and Haklady Santosh Kumar Shetty from the general category, as the vice-president, of Kundapur taluk panchayat for a term of 16 months, at the election held here on Saturday September 4. Both of them were elected unanimously, even though the BJP initially tried to create some flutters when two Congress candidates evinced interest to bag the post of the vice-president.

In the 35-member taluk panchayat, Congress Party has 20 members and the balance 15 are from the BJP.  Jyoti Putran, who already has served  as the taluk panchayat president during the first term, is lucky to be elevated to the same position for a second term during the tenure of this taluk panchayat.

In addition to Jyoti Putran, Janaki Billava of the BJP had filed nomination for the post of the president. For the vice-president’s post however, Haklady Santosh Kumar Shetty and Nagappa Kottary (both from the Congress) and Satish M Naik (BJP) filed nominations. The BJP tried to engineer a split in the vote base of the Congress, by encashing the situation arising out of the fact that two aspirants from the Congress want to bag the vice-president's post, by offering the post of the president to Kottary. However, with the deft handling of the situation by the Congress leaders, it was decided that the two vice-presidential contestants will share the remaining tenure equally at the rate of eight months each. Accordingly, Janaki Billava, Satish M Nayak and Nagappa Kottary withdrew their nomination papers, paving way for an unanimous election. 

Out of the last 20-month term of the president and vice-president, four months have already elapsed. A few people objected to holding of the election, on a day that was declared as a state holiday by the government on account of the sad demise of the Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister. After the electoral officers said that the process is being held as per the orders of the district deputy commissioner, those who raised the objection chose to remain mum.