Ashok-Alexander Sridharan | |
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| Mayor of Bonn | |
| In office 21 October 2015 –31 October 2020 | |
| Preceded by | Jürgen Nimptsch |
| Succeeded by | Katja Dörner |
| Personal details | |
| Born | June 15,1965 Bonn,West Germany (now Germany) |
Ashok-Alexander Sridharan is a German politician partly of Indian ancestry who served as Mayor of Bonn from 2015 until 2020. He is a member of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU). He was the first mayor of Bonn to be of an immigrant background. [1]
Sridharan was born in Bonn on June 15,1965 [2] to a diplomat from Kerala,India,who moved to West Germany in the 1950s,and a mother from Bonn. [3] He spent his childhood and university years in Bonn,which he used to brand himself as a "Bonn lad" during his campaign. He studied at the Aloisiuskolleg,a private and Catholic high school in Bonn,before studying law at the University of Bonn. [2]
In an interview with Deutsche Welle,Sridharen stated that his Indian roots weren't relevant to his campaign. He also stated,"I think [Indian interests] could even contribute efforts to make Bonn better-known internationally than it already is and that would do us good. We have many international companies and organizations here and I feel we have to strengthen that". Due to his ancestry,Sridharan has noted that there has been negative attention towards him through xenophobic comments. [1] [4]
Sridharan won the mayoral elections for the city of Bonn on September 13,2015 to succeed Social Democratic Party (SPD)'s Jürgen Nimptsch. In the polls,he defeated his opponent Peter Ruhenstroth-Bauer from the SPD,by polling just over 50% of the votes,while Ruhenstroth-Bauer polled 24% of the votes,in an election that saw a 45% turnout. [5] [6] He assumed office on October 21,2015. [7]
On September 27,2020,Sridharan lost the mayoral runoff election to the green party challenger Katja Dörner. [8] In a runoff that saw an overall turnout of 49%,Dörner polled 56% of the votes,while Sridharan polled 44% of the votes. [9] In the first round polls that had concluded on September 13,2020,Sridharan polled highest with 34% votes,but this was not sufficient to claim an absolute majority and had forced the runoff. Dörner had polled 28% in the first round. [10] Earlier,having expressed his intent to run for second term,he was nominated by the CDU in November 2019. [11] Dörner took office as new mayor on November 1,2020. [12]
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| National | |
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