Naveen Patnaik set to be Odisha CM for the fourth term
Bhubaneswar: BJD president Naveen Patnaik, who steered Biju Janata Dal to a landslide victory in the assembly polls in Odisha, is set to become chief minister for the fourth consecutive term as he was unanimously elected its legislature party leader on Sunday. Patnaik was chosen the BJDLP leader in the first meeting of the newly elected MLAs held at the party headquarters here, BJD sources said. Senior MLA V Sugyan Kumari Deo moved the proposal which was supported by Damodar Rout. The election was a mere ‘formality’ as he is the ‘undisputed’ leader of BJD, the sources said. After his election, Patnaik, who has been the chief minister since 2000, thanked the newly elected members to the assembly for choosing him as their leader. “We will all work together with renewed effort for the development of Odisha and its people.” BJD had swept the assembly polls in the state grabbing a lion’s share of 117 seats in the 147-member house. While raising its tally from 103 seats in 2009 to 117 this time, the regional party virtually decimated Congress as well as BJP which won 16 and 10 seats respectively. Meanwhile, the process of constitution of the new assembly has commenced with the state chief electoral officer Jyoti Prakash Dash meeting Governor S C Jamir earlier in the day and presenting him the gazette notification in this connection, official sources said. The schedule for the swearing-in of the new ministry will be finalised soon, they added. (PTI)
TRS president meets AP Governor
Hyderabad: TRS president K Chandrasekhar Rao, who is set to be the first Chief Minister of Telangana, met Andhra Pradesh Governor E S L Narasimhan here ton Sunday. Chandrasekhar Rao, who was yesterday elected leader of TRS legislature party, met the Governor accompanied by party MLAs, MPs and other leaders. “We conveyed our yesterday’s decision (electing Chandrasekhar Rao as TRSLP leader) to the Governor. We met him as a formality,” TRS MLA E Rajender told reporters. TRS secured majority by winning 63 of the 119 MLA seats in Telangana, which would come into existence as the 29th state of the country on June 2. Narasimhan is set to continue as the Governor of Telangana and residuary Andhra Pradesh states post bifurcation of the undivided AP. The TRS president won both as an MLA and MP in the recent elections. (PTI)
Over 3.9 lakh voters use NOTA option in MP Lok Sabha polls
Bhopal: More than 3.91 lakh voters exercised the ‘NOTA’ (none of the above) option in the 29 constituencies in Madhya Pradesh in the Lok Sabha polls. Out of the 3,91,797 voters who used the NOTA option in EVMs and postal ballots in the state, the maximum number of NOTA votes (30,364) came from Ratlam constituency, while the lowest number of 4,219 voters from Gwalior pressed this button, official sources said. The number of voters who exercised the NOTA option in other constituencies are as follows: Balaghat 6,922, Betul 26,726, Dewas 10,253, Guna 12,481, Chhindwara 25,499, Damoh 12,600, Dhar 15,437, Hoshangabad 18,741, Indore 5,944, Jabalpur 7,888, Khajuraho 7,838, Khandwa 17,149, Khargone 22,141, Rajgarh 10,292. Morena 4,792, Mandla 28,306, Mandsaur 8,568, Bhind 5,572, Vidisha 10,618, Bhopal 5,181, Ujjain 12,287, Tikamgarh 10,055, Sidhi 17,350, Sagar 9,504, Shahdol 21,376, Satna 13,036 and Rewa 10,658, the sources said. The Election Commission had introduced the NOTA option for the first time during 2013 assembly elections in five states. NOTA votes are counted under the category of invalid votes. (PTI)
Chargesheet filed in American tourist molestation case
Muzaffarnagar: A chargesheet has been filed against an accused taxi driver who was arrested in connection with molestation of an American tourist last week, police said on Sunday. A chargesheet was filed Saturday evening against the accused identified as Samey Singh on the basis of the victim’s statement recorded in court. The incident took place on May 11 when the victim was on her way to Rishikesh from Delhi in a taxi, SP (city) Sharvan Kumar had said. The taxi driver stopped the car near a roadside eatery Delhi-Dehradun National Highway and tried to molest her. The woman managed to flee from the spot and reached Rishikesh by another vehicle. Based on her complaint, an FIR was lodged and a case registered against Singh. On the basis of the complaint, Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Manoj Kumar Siddhu has summoned the victim for deposition tomorrow in the case after taking cognisance of the chargesheet. According to the prosecution sources, the police is trying to complete the trial before the victim leaves the country. (PTI)
For first time, BJP sweeps all 4 seats bordering Delhi
New Delhi: BJP not only won all seven seats in Delhi by big margins but also emerged victorious in the four seats adjoining the National Capital Region. The BJP candidates for the seats of Gautambudh Nagar, Ghaziabad, Faridabad and Gurgaon all defeated their rivals by margins of over 2.5 lakh votes. Gautambudh Nagar and Ghaziabad are in Uttar Pradesh while Faridabad and Gurgaon fall in Haryana. This is the first time that BJP has swept these seats bordering Delhi-NCR. Former Army chief Gen. VK Singh, who recently joined the saffron party, defeated actor-turned-politician and Congress candidate Raj Babbar by a massive 5,67,260 votes in Ghaziabad. Mahesh Sharma won the Gautam Buddha Nagar constituency — comprising Noida and Greater Noida — for BJP after defeating senior Samajwadi Party leader Narendra Bhatti. Bhatti is the leader who had claimed that he got IAS officer Durga Shakti Nagpal suspended in just 40 minutes in the episode which had caused a furore in Uttar Pradesh last year. The party was unstoppable in Gurgaon as well with its candidate Inderjit Singh Rao defeating top AAP leader Yogendra Yadav by 5,65,328 votes. BJP also swept Faridabad by a huge margin with its candidate Krishan Pal trouncing Congress’s Avtar Singh Bhadana by a margin of 4,66,873 votes. Pal got 6,52, 516 votes while Bhadana polled just 1,85,643 votes. (PTI)