After 40 years a non Congressman is the deputy chief of RS

On the penultimate day of the monsoon session of parliament , members voted to elect the deputy chairman of the Rajya Sabha. The ruling NDA fielded Janata Dal (United) MP Harivansh Narayan Singh, while the opposition backed three-time member of parliament BK Hariprasad of the Congress, for the post. NDA’s Harivansh Narayan Singh won quite easily with 125 votes in his favour, while 105 votes went in favour of the opposition candidate.

Harivansh Narayan Singh hails from the village Sitab Diara, best known as the birthplace of socialist leader Jai Prakash Narayan. The village has a unique distinction of having expanse in two districts – Saran and Ballia – across two states, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. Both states claim their authority over the village. Harivansh Narayan Singh was born on June 30, 1956.

Harivansh Narayan Singh was a follower of Jai Prakash Narayan. He completed his education from the Banaras Hindu University in Varanasi, now the parliamentary constituency of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He is a first-time MP of the JDU.

Known as a close aide of Nitish Kumar, Harivansh Narayan Singh was elected to the Rajya Sabha in April 2014. He is a former journalist, known for his long innings with Hindi daily, Prabhat Khabar, based out of Ranchi, the Jharkhand capital.

Harivansh Narayan Singh has also worked with Bank of India for a brief period. He quit the job of bank officer to pursue his career in journalism. Harivansh Narayan Singh was the media advisor to former Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar.

Despite the opposition having numbers the ruling NDA was able to get the votes in faovur of its Candidate, and for the first time in last forty years it would be a non congress deputy speaker of the Rajya Sabha. It has been made possible by Prime Minister Narendra Modi making a phone call to Biju Janata Dal’s (BJD) chief Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik.  Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke to Patnaik over phone to seek his support for the deputy chairman’s election.

Even before that, the BJD did not support the Opposition’s no-trust vote against the Narendra Modi government in the Lok Sabha on July 20— the message was communicated to MPs just minutes before the debate started — and stood with the government on the issue of National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Assam.