INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Talapady gram panchayat in Karnataka's Dakshina Kannada district with the support of the members backed by the Bharatiya Janata Party
(BJP).Meanwhile, BJP-backed member Pushpavathy Shetty was unanimously elected the vice president during the election held at the Dr APJ
Abdul Kalam auditorium of the gram panchayat on Thursday.Out of the total 24 members, while 13 members were elected with the backing of the
BJP, 10 members were backed by the SDPI
The gram panchayat has only one member backed by the Congress
Initially, both BJP-backed Satyaraj and SDPI-backed T Ismail polled equal number of votes in the election held for the post of president
Though the BJP was expecting a smooth victory of party supported candidate Satyaraj, results embarrassed the saffron party as two of their
members had cross-voted in favour of Ismail
Member backed by the Congress, Vaibhav Shetty, and one of the SDPI backed members Habiba had remained absent during the polling.Following
this, returning officer Shwetha, who is the child development project officer, decided to draw lots to decide who would be the president
In this process, Ismail was elected president in the presence of panchayat development officer Keshava.
