Bengaluru: BJP candidate Gautham Kumar Jain was elected as the new Mayor of  Bengaluru City during the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) Mayoral elections held here this morning. 

Gautham defeated Congress candidate R.S. Satyanarayana. With this victory, BJP will be taking over the reins of BBMP after a gap of four years.

Gautham Kumar Jain, a member of Marwari community, and a two-time Corporator from Jogupalya Ward in Shantinagar Assembly Constituency, received 129 votes in his favour, while Congress candidate R.S. Sathyanarayana received 112 votes. Earlier, Padmanabha Reddy from BJP, who had also filed nomination for the top post, withdrew at the last moment to make way for Gautham’s election as Mayor. Meanwhile, BJP’s Ram Mohan Raju of Bommanahalli Ward was also elected as Deputy Mayor defeating of Gangamma of JD(S). Earlier, two JD(S) Corporators — Manjula Narayanaswamy and Devadas boycotted polls by staging a walk out. Finance Minister and BJP Rajya Sabha MP from Karnataka Nirmala Sitharaman was absent for polls so also Congress MP from Bengaluru Rural D.K. Suresh, MLC Raghu Achar, MP Jairam Ramesh and JD(S) MLA D. Manjunath.