Ex-Union minister Narendra Singh Tomar elected speaker of MP assembly
Bhopal (PTI): Senior BJP leader and former Union minister Narendra Singh Tomar was on Wednesday unanimously elected as the speaker of the Madhya Pradesh legislative assembly.
The first session of the newly-elected assembly began on Monday.
Chief Minister Mohan Yadav on Wednesday moved a proposal for the election of 66-year-old Tomar as the speaker which was seconded by leader of opposition Umang Singhar.
Former Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan also moved a proposal for the election of Tomar as the speaker which was seconded by ex-Union minister Prahlad Patel, who recently won from Narsinghpur assembly seat in the state.
Five more proposals, including by opposition Congress MLAs Ajay Singh, Jaivardhan Singh and Rajendra Kumar Singh, were also moved in favour of Tomar.
After the voice vote, pro-tem speaker Gopal Bhargava declared Tomar as elected unanimously to the speaker's post.
Tomar filed his nomination for the speaker's post on Monday with the support of the opposition Congress.
Chief Minister Mohan Yadav on Wednesday congratulated Tomar and also thanked the opposition for unanimously electing the speaker.
Yadav said Tomar has been equally popular among the ruling and opposition leaders.
LoP Singhar, ex-CM Chouhan and other leaders also congratulated Tomar.
Tomar, who got his first electoral victory as a corporator in Gwalior in 1983, was elected from Dimani assembly seat of Morena district in the recently concluded state elections.
He held different posts, including state president of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha and later state chief of the BJP.
In 1998, Tomar entered the state assembly after winning from Gwalior seat.
Tomar was again elected from the same seat in 2003. He then became a cabinet minister in the BJP-led state government.
For a brief period in 2009, Tomar was elected to the Rajya Sabha from the state. Later in the same year, he was elected to the Lok Sabha from Morena seat.
In the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, Tomar was elected on the BJP ticket from Gwalior parliamentary seat and became Union cabinet minister in the Narendra Modi government.
Tomar's seat was changed in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections when he successfully contested from Morena and retained ministerial berth at the Centre.
On December 3, the ruling BJP recorded a thumping victory in Madhya Pradesh by winning 163 seats in the 230-member assembly. The Congress, which had bagged 114 seats in 2018, won just 66 segments, while Bharat Adivasi Party candidate Kamleshwar Dodiyar pocketed the Sailana constituency.
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Wildfires race across Chile, leaving 15 dead, forcing thousands to flee
Penco (Chile) (AP): Wildfires raging across central and southern Chile on Sunday left at least 15 people dead, scorched thousands of acres of forest and destroyed scores of homes, authorities said, as the South American country swelters under a heat wave.
Chilean President Gabriel Boric declared a state of catastrophe in the country's central Biobio region and the neighbouring Nuble region, around 500 kilometres south of Santiago, the capital.
The emergency designation allows greater coordination with the military to rein in two dozen wildfires that have so far blazed through 8,500 hectares and prompted 50,000 people to evacuate, according to Chilean Security Minister Luis Cordero.
“All resources are available,” Boric wrote on X.
But local officials reported that for hours on Sunday, destruction was everywhere and help from the federal government was nowhere.
“Dear President Boric, from the bottom of my heart, I have been here for four hours, a community is burning and there is no (government) presence,” said Rodrigo Vera, the mayor of the small coastal town of Penco in the Biobio region. “How can a minister do nothing but call me to tell me that the military is going to arrive at some point?”
Firefighters were struggling to extinguish the flames, but strong winds and scorching weather hampered their efforts Sunday with temperatures topping 38 C (100 F).
Residents said that the fires took them by surprise after midnight, trapping them in their homes.
“Many people didn't evacuate. They stayed in their houses because they thought the fire would stop at the edge of the forest,” said John Guzman, 55, surveying the scene in Penco, where smoke blanketed the sky in an orange haze. “It was completely out of control. No one expected it."
Although the total number of homes burned nationwide remained unclear, one municipality of Concepcion in Biobio reported 253 homes destroyed.
“We fled running, with the kids, in the dark,” said Juan Lagos, 52, also in Penco. The fire engulfed most of the city, burning cars, a school and a church.
Charred bodies were found across fields, homes, along roads and in cars.
“From what we can see, there are people who died ... and we knew them well," said Víctor Burboa, 54. "Everyone here knew them.”
