Left Democratic Front candidate K.K. Jayamma of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI (M)] was elected chairperson of the Alappuzha municipality on Thursday. Alappuzha Subcollector Sooraj Shaji administered her the oath of office.
In the election held to the post, Ms. Jayamma, representing the Nehru Trophy ward, secured 35 votes in the 52-member municipal council. United Democratic Front candidate Ambili Aravind of the Congress bagged nine votes while Bharatiya Janata Party candidate Suma got three votes. The vote cast by a CPI(M) councillor was declared invalid. While a Congress member was absent, another three councillors abstained from voting.
Internal pact
The election was necessitated following the resignation of Soumya Raj of the CPI(M) from the post last month. Ms. Raj stepped down as part of an agreement within the party for sharing the top post in the civic body.
Ms. Jayamma said that she would work for the welfare of the people and ensure that the LDF retained power in the next local body polls. The chairperson said that waste management would be a priority for the council led by her. She said that bio-mining to clear mounds of legacy waste at the Sarvodayapuram landfill site would begin soon.
The civic body has earlier made a budgetary allocation of ₹3.7 crore for carrying out bio-mining at the site. As per a total station survey conducted by the municipality, the yard has 30,101.690 cubic metre of legacy waste.
