Former Congressman Jyotiraditya Scindia hogged the limelight on Wednesday as he took oath as a BJP MP in the Rajya Sabha and exchanged greetings with his old party colleague and bitter rival Digvijay Singh, who too was among the 45 parliamentarians who were administered the oath of affirmation by Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu.
Deepender Hooda, Shakti Sinh Gohil, Sharad Pawar, Rajeev Satav and Priyanka Chaturvedi were among others.
Owing to the Covid-19 pandemic, the oath of affirmation to 45 of the total 61 members newly elected to the Upper House from 22 States was held in the Rajya Sabha chambers and for the first time during inter-session. Other MPs who were not present for the ceremony will be administered the oath at a later date.
With 19 BJP MPs taking the Oath on Wednesday, BJP’s strength in the Upper House has now gone up to 86.
Sumer Singh Solanki from Madhya Pradesh; Nabam Rebia from Arunachal Pradesh; Bhubaneswar Kalita and Biswajit Daimary from Assam; Vivek Thakur from Bihar; Abhay Bharadwaj, Ramilaben Bara and Narhari Amin from Gujarat; Ram Chander Jangra from Haryana; Indu Goswami from Himachal Pradesh; Deepak Prakash from Jharkhand; Ashok Gasti and Iranna Kadadi from Karnataka; Udayanraje Bhosale and Bhagwat Karad from Maharashtra; Maharaja Leishemba Sanajaoba from Manipur; K Vanlalvena from Mizoram; and Rajendra Gehlot from Rajasthan were others who took the Oath.
The numbers of the National Democratic Alliance has gone up to 100 in the 245-member upper house. Parties friendly to the BJP, such as the BJD, AIADMK and the YSRCP, too saw an increase in their tally.
From the Congress, which has 41 MPs in the house, the leaders who took oath were KTS Tulsi from Chhattisgarh; Shaktisinh Gohil from Gujarat; Deepender Singh
Hooda from Haryana; Mallikarjun Kharge from Karnataka; Digvijay Singh from Madhya Pradesh; Rajeev Satav from Maharashtra; and Neeraj Dangi and KC Venugopal from Rajasthan.
Oath was also administered to JDU’s Harivansh and Ramnath Thakur and RJD’s AD Singh and Prem Chand Gupta from Bihar; and to Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya, of the CPI-M from
West Bengal. Priyanka Chaturvedi from Shiv Sena, NCP chief Sharad Pawar and RPI chief and minister of state for social justice and empowerment Ramdas Athawale were administered the oath from Maharashtra.
Three MPs from YSRCP, who represent Andhra Pradesh, include Ayodhya Rami Reddy Alla, Pilli Subhaschandra Bose and Venkataramana Rao Mopidevi.
Representing Odisha, Muzibulla Khan, Subash Singh, Sujeet Kumar and Mamata Mohanta from the Biju Janata Dal also took oath. From Tamil Nadu, KP Munusamy of the AIADMK and M Thambidurai of the AIADMK and GK Vasan of the Tamil Maanila Congress also took oath.
Of the 61 new MPs, 49 were elected to the upper house for the first time while 12 were re-elected.
After vacancies arose in March in 20 states, 42 were elected unopposed, including 28 first timers, and elections were held for 19 vacancies and 15 other first-timers won a berth in the Rajya Sabha.
Addressing the new members, Naidu said they should reflect on their role and responsibility and not fall for the temptation of disrupting the House for short-term gains.