City mayor gets elected as councillor defeating BJP candidate

West Bengal minister and city Mayor Firhad Hakim Wednesday registered a resounding victory in the bypoll to a Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) ward by defeating his nearest BJP rival by a margin of 13,987 votes.

The result also witnessed a significant drop in the vote share of the BJP when compared to 2015 election.

Hakim, the TMC candidate for Ward 82 of KMC, secured 16,564 votes whereas BJP's Jiban Sen bagged 2,577 votes. Sisir Dutta from the CPI won 1,735 votes, while Congress candidate Animesh Bhattacharya received 537 votes.

"This is a victory of the people. I want to thank the masses. The TMC-run KMC would work for the development of people," Hakim , the first Muslim Mayor of Kolkata since Independence, said after the announcement of the results.

Taking a dig at the BJP for drop in its vote share, Hakim said the saffron party will be wiped out of the state after 2019 Lok Sabha polls. In 2015, the BJP had secured 4900 votes in the ward.

"After the CPI(M), it's time for the BJP to vanish from Bengal. One day, all votes cast in Bengal will go to the Trinamool Congress," he said.

Hakim, the state's Urban Development and Municipal Affairs Minister, was elected as the Mayor of Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) on December 3.

As he was not a councillor in the civic body, he had to contest polls from a ward to continue on the post, as mandated by the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (second amendment) Bill, 2018.

The amended Act enables a person, who is not an elected councillor, to be appointed as the mayor of the KMC. The person, however, would have to get elected as a corporator within six months of his appointment.

Bypoll in ward 82 was necessitated after Trinamool Congress councillor Pranab Biswas resigned on health ground.

The mayoral election became imperative in November last year following the resignation of Sovan Chatterjee from the post.

Chatterjee, who was also the housing and fire services minister, resigned from the state Cabinet on November 20 and from the post of KMC Mayor two days later.