Greater Hyderabad Mayor poll today

Hyderabad: The stage is set for the election of Mayor and Deputy Mayor of Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) on Thursday. The GHMC elections had witnessed a pitched battle between ruling TRS and the BJP in December.

In a strategic move to contain internal dissension, TRS chief K Chandrasekhar Rao announced that the name of the woman mayor would be sent to the chief whip on the morning of the polling day with a clear-cut strategy to bag the two posts though it does not have the magic figure in terms of the votes that would be required to elect mayor and deputy mayor were worked out long back.

Reliable sources said that TRS has selected Banjara Hills corporator Gadwal Vijayalaxmi for the Mayor post.

In all probability, the MIM is likely to abstain from voting and this would help the TRS to bag both the mayor and deputy mayor posts. TRS emerged as the single largest party and bagged 56 divisions, while BJP secured 48 divisions and MIM won in 44 divisions and the Congress won in two divisions, in the 150-seat civic body.

The TRS has 32 ex-officio members in addition to 56 divisions. On the other hand their friendly party MIM has 44 members and another 10 ex-officio members.

The BJP's strength has come down to 47 following the death of one of its members. It has two ex-officio members. To ensure that nothing goes wrong during polling, the TRS has made the minister for MAUD K T Rama Rao, Parliamentary Party leader K Keshava Rao and Minister Talsani Srinivas Yadav as in-charges.

The TRS corporators and ex-officio members will meet at TRS Bhavan in the morning where they will be briefed on the process and from there all will go to GHMC. Meanwhile, the BJP also decided to put up its candidates for both Mayor and Deputy Mayor to expose the "opportunist, dubious backhand deal" with AIMIM.

TRS sources said their Mayoral and Deputy Mayoral candidates names will be given to its members in sealed covers.

The Lok Sabha MPs and MLAs, who have their vote in the city are ex-officio members of the corporation. Besides, MLCs and Rajya Sabha members, who have their vote in the city, must give an option, choosing the GHMC, to be able to vote.