Biju Janata Dal (BJD) President Naveen Patnaik was sworn-inas the Chief Minister of Odisha for a fifth consecutive term on Wednesday afterhe was re-elected with a decisive majority in the Assembly elections.
He was administered the oath of office and secrecy byGovernor Ganeshi Lal in the presence of thousands of people and dignitaries atIdco Exhibition Ground here.
The 72-year-old BJD chief has become one of thelongest-serving chief ministers of the coastal state.
Twenty ministers including 11 cabinet ministers and nineministers of state were also administered the oath of office and secrecy.
The cabinet ministers are Ranendra Pratap Swain, BikramKeshari Arukh, Prafulla Kumar Mallick, Niranjan Pujari, Padmanabh Behera,Pratap Jena, Arun Kumar Sahoo, Sudam Marndi, Susant Singh, Naba Kishore Das andTukuni Sahu.
The ministers of state are Ashok Chandra Panda, Samir RanjanDash, Jyoti Prakash Panigrahi, Dibya Shankar Mishra, Premananda Nayak,Raghunandan Das, Padmini Dian, Tusharkanti Behera and Jagannath Saraka.
For the first time in the last two decades, Patnaik held theswearing-in ceremony in open. It was attended by some prominent dignitariesfrom different fields including industry, art, culture, education and civilsociety.
Patnaik’s elder sister and noted writer Gita Mehta and hisbrother Prem Patnaik were also seen in the event.
The Biju Janata Dal, which secured 112 seats in the147-member Odisha Assembly in the recently-concluded election, held along withLok Sabha polls, has been in power in the state since 2000.