After being elected as MlA from Ranapur constituency, Rabinarayan Mohapatra on Saturday resigned from the Rajya Sabha seat on Saturday. Mohapatra was elected to Rajya Sabha on March 23, 2012. Behera has taken oath as member of the State Assembly on May 23.
With the resignation of Behera, BJD’s strength in Rajya Sabha has reduced to three now. Earlier, Sashi Bhushan Behera had resigned from the Upper House after being elected as MlA from the Jaydev seat.
Similarly, AU Singhdeo who was elected to RS had not taken oath as he entered the Assembly poll fray from Balangir seat.The present three BJD Rajya Sabha members are Dillip Tirkey, Kalpataru Das and Baishnab Parida. AV Swami is a BJD supported Independent RS member.According to information, biennial election would be held on June 19 to elect a lone member to Rajya Sabha from Odisha.