Sonia Gandhi, Ashwini Vaishnaw take oath as Rajya Sabha members

NEW DELHI: Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi and Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw were among the 14 individuals who took the oath as members of the Rajya Sabha on Thursday.

Vice-President and Rajya Sabha Chairman Jagdeep Dhankhar administered the oath to them in the new Parliament house building.

While Mrs Sonia Gandhi took the oath as a member of the Upper House from Rajasthan, Vaishnaw was sworn in as a member of the same house from Odisha.

Congress leaders Ajay Maken and Syed Naseer Hussain from Karnataka, BJP leader R.P.N. Singh from Uttar Pradesh, and BJP member Samik Bhattacharya from West Bengal were also among the 14 who took the Rajya Sabha oath.

Sanjay Kumar Jha of JD(U) also took the oath as a member from Bihar, Subhashish Khuntia and Debashish Samantaray, both of BJD, took the oath as members from Odisha, while Madan Rathore of BJP took the oath as an RS member representing Rajasthan.

YSRC leaders Golla Baburao, Meda Raghunadha Reddy, and Yerram Venkata Subba Reddy, and BRS leader Ravi Chandra Vaddiraju from Telangana also took the oath as members representing the state of Andhra Pradesh.

They all later took a group photograph with the RS Chairman.

The Rajya Sabha secretariat clarified that the terms of the members from Odisha and Rajasthan commenced from Thursday, while all others began their term from Wednesday.

Sonia Gandhi became a Rajya Sabha member for the first time, and she took the oath in the presence of Leader of the House Piyush Goyal and Congress president and Leader of Opposition in the Rajya Sabha, Mallikarjun Kharge.

Her daughter Priyanka Gandhi Vadra was also present during her oath-taking ceremony.

Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairman Harivansh and Secretary-General P C Mody were also in attendance.