Karwar: Six members of Sirsi City Municipal Council (CMC) including the president were disqualified by Deputy Commissioner S S Nakul, who is also the district magistrate of Uttara Kannada district.

According to sources, DC has disqualified six members for allegedly violating a whip. It is said that, out of 31 wards, Congress had won 20 seats while BJP got 10 and one was won by an independent candidate. But when the election was conducted for the post of the president, the Congress fielded Jagdish Gowda as its candidate, but despite having a clear majority, the Congress failed to come to power in the CMC because seven of its members did not support their own party candidate and instead of Jagdish Gowda, Pradeep Shetty got the majority with support of 10 BJP members and won the president seat.

Bheemanna Naik, president of Uttara Kannada District Congress Committee, had filed a petition with the district magistrate demanding disqualification of these seven members for violating whip.

Hearing the case, District Magistrate S S Nakul disqualified six members on Monday, but one of the dissidents has managed to save his membership.

The six Congress members who have been disqualified for the Sirsi CMC are President Pradeep Shetty, councillors Sudhakar Shetty, Sheelu Blej Vaaz, Noronha Francis Pedru, Sridhar Moger and Razia Sheikh.

Welcoming the decision of the district magistrate, Bheemanna Naik said people get attracted to the political party because of its philosophy. "It is not fair to quit that party or violate its whip after getting elected on a party’s ticket, it is a lesson to those who violated the whip of the party", he added.