Bikram Keshari Arukh Elected Speaker Of Odisha Assembly

Bhubaneswar: Bikram Keshari Arukh, former minister and BJD MLA from Bhanjanagar, was on Monday elected Speaker of the Odisha Legislative Assembly.

Arukh was elected Speaker at a special session of the Assembly. He was elected unopposed, becoming the 21st Speaker of the Odisha Assembly. The House was adjourned following the election.

Of the 147 Assembly seats, the ruling BJD has 113 members while the opposition BJP and Congress have 22 and 9 members respectively.

Arukh was tipped to be the next Speaker ever since Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik asked all his ministers to resign on June 4 and a new council of 21 ministers was sworn in on June 5. Arukh was Forest & Environment Minister in the outgoing ministry.

Surjya Narayan Patro also resigned as Speaker on June 4. His son Biplab Patro, however, said that his father quit on health grounds. “My father is suffering from serious kidney ailments and a serious bacterial infection in his left eye. He has been undergoing treatment at Sum Ultimate hospital,” he said then.