Odisha Urban Polls: Congress Announces Candidate For Cuttack Mayor Post; Check The Probable Aspirants From BJD, BJP

Bhubaneswar: The Congress has finalised candidates for elections to 56 corporator seats in Cuttack Municipal Corporation (CMC) with Giribala Behera being projected as the Mayor candidate, Congress Working president Chiranjib Biswal informed on Wednesday.

Giribala is the president of the party’s city unit, and was earlier elected as a CMC corporator. She is said to have played a key role in the election of Mohammed Moquim as Cuttack-Barabati MLA in 2019.

The BJD, however, has been retaining the CMC council for the last two terms and its probable aspirants include former corporator Ranjan Biswal, president and secretary of city BJD unit Madhu Sudan Sahu and Prasant Nayak respectively, former mayor Soumendra Ghose, Odia actress Varsha Priyadarshini, CMC administrator Anil Samal, former Commissioner Rabi Nanda, among others.

For BJP, which had bagged the first Mayor post after the formation of CMC in 2003, the list of probable aspirants includes Odia actor Sritam Das, senior leader Binod Das, president of the city unit of the party Lalatendu Badu, state minority community cell president Sikandar Ali and women’s wing leader Smruti Patnaik.

Mayors of municipal corporations and chairpersons of municipalities and Notified Area Councils (NACs) will be directly elected in the election to 106 Urban Local Body (ULB) and three municipal corporations, which is being on March 24 in the state after a delay of more than two years.

There will be two EVMs in each booth — one to elect the mayor/chairperson and another for corporator/councillor. NOTA (None of the above) option will also be available for the first time in ULB polls.

While candidates can file nominations till March 7, the scrutiny of papers will take place on March 9. Nominations can be withdrawn till March 14, the State Election Commission had said in a notification issued on February 28.

In the last major polls in September 2013, the BJD had swept the elections by winning 44 of 66 urban bodies. The Congress had bagged 12 while the BJP could win from only one ULB. In the rest, no party had attained a clear majority.