Sena woman elected Mumbai Mayor

Special Correspondent

Shubha Raul defeated Congress nominee Sheetal Mhatre

Raul is the third woman mayor in the civic body’s 124-year-old history Shiv Sena repeated its success story in Thane also polling 64 votes

MUMBAI: A Shiv Sena municipal councillor, Shubha Raul, was elected Mayor of Mumbai on Saturday defeating the Congress nominee, Sheetal Mhatre.

Dr. Raul, a physician elected from the northern suburb of Dahisar, is the third woman Mayor of the 124-year-old civic body. She polled 117 votes against Ms. Mhatre’s 100. Vidya Thakur of the Bharatiya Janata Party was elected Deputy Mayor by the same votes. She defeated Bharati Pisal of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP).

The municipal corporation of Mumbai and nine other cities had gone to poll on February 1 to elect 227 members. The Shiv Sena got 83 seats and its ally — the BJP — 28. But Dr. Raul and Ms. Thakur polled six votes more as two members of the Akhil Bharatiya Sena and four independents voted for the saffron alliance.

The Congress has 71 members and the NCP 14 members. Their candidates were supported by seven members of Raj Thackeray’s Maharashtra Navnirman Sena..