BHUBANESWAR: Senior Biju Janata Dal (BJD) leader and seven-time legislator Surjya Narayan Patro was on Saturday elected unopposed as the Speaker of Odisha Legislative Assembly.Patro’s name was proposed by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik and supported by the Parliamentary Affairs Minister Bikram Keshari Arukh and other members of the House.Pro-tem Speaker Amar Prasad Satpathy announced Patro’s name and invited him to take charge as the Speaker.
The Digapahandi MLA was elected uncontested as the Speaker of the 16th Odisha Legislative Assembly as the BJP members preferred to stay away from the House. Patro became the 22nd speaker of the Odisha Legislative Assembly.
Seven-time MLA Patro has been winning elections since 1990 without a break. He won the Assembly elections four times from Mohana constituency and thrice from Digapahandi.
He has held several ministerial portfolios like Revenue and Disaster Management, Information and Public Relations, Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare, Cooperation, Energy, Science and Technology, Tourism, Information Technology, Culture, Energy, Forest and Environment and Fisheries and Animal Resources Development in Naveen Patnaik’s last four terms.
Surjya Patro elected Speaker unopposed
In the previous government, Patro was the Minister for Cooperation, Food Supplies and Consumer Welfare.After pro-tem speaker announced Patro’s name as the new Speaker, he was escorted to the Speaker’s podium by the Chief Minister and senior Congress leader Narasingha Mishra. “I congratulate the new Speaker,” Patnaik said.
“We hope the new Speaker will function above political considerations and give protection to the Opposition to further strengthen democracy,” Mishra said. Patro thanked the leader of the House and all the members for electing him to the post of Speaker. “I am happy that the House elected me to the post of the Speaker unanimously,” Patro said.Disapproving the absence of the BJP legislators, Mishra, who was Leader of Opposition in the last Assembly, said this is not a healthy trend in democracy.
As the ruling BJD has 112 MLAs in the 147-member Assembly, the election to the post of the Speaker was a mere formality. The BJP has 23 MLAs while the Congress has nine, the CPI (M) one seat and there is an Independent member.