Cuttack mayor by-poll on Jan 22

The by-election to the office of the mayor of Cuttack Municipal Corporation (CMC) would be held on January 22.
This was ordered by the State Election Commission (SEC). As per the order, notices to CMC corporators would be issued on January 14 to take part in the by-election.
The nomination, scrutiny, withdrawal, election, counting and declaration of result will be made on the same day which is on January 22, the order said adding that the publication of the name of the duly elected mayor in official gazette would be held on January 25.
The post of the CMC mayor fell vacant on December 29, 2015 when the then mayor Anita Behera put in her papers after it was revealed that she had managed to obtain a ration card under NFSA to receive subsidised food grains. Her resignation was accepted by the CMC council on January 4 this year.

Since the post of CMC mayor is reserved for a scheduled caste woman for the current term, the January 22 by-election would be a showdown limited to five other corporators of this category. They are Baishali Behera and Ta'poi Sethy of Congress and Sulochana Sethy, Meenakshi Behera and Mamata Behera of BJD.
The CMC council now has 58 members with Anita Behera also quitting her position as corporator. The ruling BJD with 36 corporators is all set to regain the mayoral position if nothing untoward happens during the run-up to next week's by election.