Five newly-elected Gujarat MLAs take oath

Five newly-elected MLAs in Gujarat, four of BJP and one from Congress, who won the just-concluded bye-elections, were administered oath on Monday by Assembly Speaker Vaju Vala.

Vala administered the oath of office and secrecy to Jasha Barad (Somnath), Rajendrasinh Chavda (Himmatnagar), Bavku Undhad (Lathi), Pankaj Mehta (Rapar) - all from BJP - and Harshad Ribadiya (Visavadar) of Congress in his Assembly chamber.

They took oath in the presence of Deputy Speaker Mangu Patel, BJP Chief Whip in the Assembly Pankaj Desai and state ministers Ganpat Vasava and Vasan Ahir among others.

Besides winning all the 26 Lok Sabha seats in Gujarat, BJP has bagged four out of the seven Assembly constituencies where bye-polls were held on April 30 and results declared on May 16. The remaining three seats went to Opposition Congress.

Congress MLAs Shaktisinh Gohil (Abdasa) and Anand Chaudhary (Mandavi) could not take oath today and will do so later.