BENGALURU: Congress has finalised the names of the three leaders to be nominated as MLCs. They are educationists Mansoor Ali Khan and MR Seetharam and former IRS officer Sudama Das, who also served as a co-chairman of a KPCC committee. Das is a Scheduled Caste (left).
These names were sent to the party central leadership in a sealed cover and have arrived back with the approvals. The list is expected to be handed over to Governor Thawaarchand Gehlot for approval.
As the three will be directly nominated, they will not face any election. They will replace three nominated members -- former mayor PR Ramesh, filmmaker Mohan Kondajji and social activist CM Lingappa, who completed their six-year terms in May-June.
There are 11 nominated members in the Council and five are from the BJP — CP Yogeshwara, Bharati Shetty, Shantaram Siddi, Adagur Vishwanath and Talwar Sabanna. The lone JDS nominee is KA Thippeswamy. Two other nominated MLCs from Congress are Prakash Rathore and UB Venkatesh.
With these nominations and the election of three Congress members -- Jagadish Shettar, Bose Raju and Kamaknoor Thippanappa -- a foregone conclusion, the Congress numbers in the Council will go up to 29 as against the present 23. BJP will, however, remain the largest party with 34 seats.
“Congress will have to work out a strategy to gain control of the House or wait till the next election to be in control of the Council with its sheer numbers. Only if Congress becomes the single-largest party in the Council, will will get the chairman’s post.
Seetharam is a former minister and former MLA from Malleswaram. He is part of the MS Ramaiah group of institutions and will be nominated as an educationist.
Mansoor Ali Khan is a trustee of DPS which runs around ten schools in Bengaluru and Mysuru. He is also a trustee with an English newspaper. He will be nominated as an educationist and journalist. Sudhama Das, a former bureaucrat, will be nominated as a social worker.