Odisha Assembly Elections 2024 | Who is Pravati Parida, state's first-ever female deputy chief minister?

Odisha on Tuesday appointed four-time MLA and tribal leader Mohan Charan Majhi as its chief minister after the saffron party won the assembly elections with a landslide, wresting power from the Naveen Patnaik-led BJD. Along with Majhi, Kanak Vardhan Singh Deo and Pravati Parida became the deputy CMs.

Parida's appointment is historic as she is the first female deputy chief minister of Odisha. Parida won the Nimapara seat in Puri by a margin of 4,588 votes against BJD leader Dilip Kumar Nayak when the results were announced on June 4.

.Mohan Charan Majhi pays floral tributes to Odisha's icons ahead of swearing-in. Top BJP leaders including PM Narendra Modi, Rajnath Singh and others shared photos of the oath-taking ceremony and congratulated the elected ministers on X.

. Who is Pravati Parida?

According to information on MyNeta, Pravati Parida, hailing from Nimapara is 57 years old and a lawyer by profession and completed her LLB course from Utkal University, Bhuvaneshwar and enrolled as an advocate in the Odisha High Court in 1995. She also did her M.A. in Public Administration in 2005.

Parida is married to Shyam Sundar Nayak, a former government servant.

Role in the BJP

A report in the Hindustan Times said Parida had joined the Bharatiya Janata Party after practicing as a lawyer for several years. She earlier served as the saffron party's women's wing chief in the state.

Parida won the Nimapara seat in Puri by a margin of 4,588 votes against BJD leader Dilip Kumar Nayak.

Candidature history

This is the fourth time Parida has contested the elections from the Nimapara seat. She was defeated by BJD's Samir Ranjan Dash in both 2014 and 2019 assembly elections, data from IndiaVotes showed. She had also contested the same seat in 2009 but managed to garner only 4.52 per cent of the votes, data showed.

.Odisha's tribal CM: How Mohan Charan Majhi performed in past Assembly elections. According to myneta.info, Pravati Parida was married to Shyam Sundar Nayak, a former government employee. She has assets worth 3.6 crores which includes Rs. 2 crore in movable assets and Rs 1.7 crore in immovable assets while her liabilities add up to Rs 45 lakhs.

The BJP candidate, as per her election affidavit has a total of 9 criminal cases against her.

Assets, Liabilities

Parida has declared assets worth over Rs 3 crore, according to data from MyNeta and no liabilities.

Apart from PM Modi, BJP chief JP Nadda, Union Ministers Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh, Bhupender Yadav, Dharmendra Pradhan, Jual Oram, Ashwini Vaishnaw and others attended the oath-taking ceremony of Majhi, Parida and Singh Deo on Wednesday.

(Devyani Kumar is a student pursuing BA Communication Studies at Mount Carmel College and interned with Deccan Herald in summer 2024)

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