BPSC 70th CCE Prelims General Studies · Question 150 of 143

Correct — A, Keonjhar. Mohan Charan Majhi was elected in 2024 from the Keonjhar assembly constituency in Keonjhar district, polling 87,815 votes for a vote share of 47.05 per cent, and was sworn in as the fifteenth Chief Minister of Odisha on 12 June 2024. The seat is not new to him: 2024 was his fourth win there, after 2000, 2004 and 2019. His elevation marked two breaks with the past. It ended the twenty-four-year tenure of Naveen Patnaik, Chief Minister continuously since March 2000, and it made Majhi the first person from the Santal tribal community to hold the office. He took charge with two deputies, Kanak Vardhan Singh Deo and Pravati Parida. The option set is built with some care, and one distractor deserves attention: Telkoi is another assembly constituency in the same district, Keonjhar, so a candidate who recalls only that the new Chief Minister comes from Keonjhar district and not that he sits for the Keonjhar seat itself can still lose the mark. Hinjili is Naveen Patnaik's long-held constituency in Ganjam district, which puts the outgoing Chief Minister's seat on the list beside the incoming one — a neat trap for anyone answering by association with 'the Chief Minister of Odisha' rather than by remembering the name in the stem.

• (b)Laikera — Not a seat Mohan Charan Majhi has represented, and not one associated with the 2024 change of government in Odisha. It functions as the neutral filler in the list — a name unfamiliar enough that a candidate cannot place it, and therefore cannot use it to reason.
• (c)Hinjili — Naveen Patnaik's constituency in Ganjam district, held by him through his long tenure as Chief Minister. It is on the list precisely because it is the seat most strongly associated with the phrase 'Chief Minister of Odisha' — but the stem names Majhi, and Majhi has never contested from Hinjili.
• (d)Telkoi — The sharpest near-miss: another assembly constituency inside Keonjhar district itself. Knowing that the new Chief Minister is a tribal leader from Keonjhar district is not enough to answer, because the district contains more than one seat and only one of them is his.

A Chief Minister is appointed by the Governor under Article 164, which also provides that the other ministers are appointed by the Governor on the Chief Minister's advice and that the Council of Ministers is collectively responsible to the Legislative Assembly of the State. The Constitution does not require the Chief Minister to be a member of the Assembly at the moment of appointment, but a minister who is not a member for six consecutive months ceases to hold office — which is why in practice the Chief Minister is almost always a sitting MLA, and why the constituency he represents is a matter of record. Odisha's 2024 election was held simultaneously with the Lok Sabha poll for its 147 assembly seats and produced the state's first Bharatiya Janata Party government, displacing the Biju Janata Dal after twenty-four continuous years. Keonjhar is a Scheduled Tribe district in northern Odisha, best known outside the state for its iron-ore mining belt, and returning a Santal leader from it to the Chief Minister's chair was read as a significant tribal-representation moment in a state where Scheduled Tribes are a large share of the population.

For a question of this shape the useful preparation is a very short list — for each state, the Chief Minister, the party, the constituency and the date of taking office — because BPSC asks any one of those four and treats the rest as distractors. Where the constituency has not been memorised, two moves narrow the field. First, discard the option that belongs to somebody else: Hinjili is Naveen Patnaik's seat, and a setter who wants to punish loose association will always include the predecessor's constituency. Second, be alert to two options from the same district, which is a deliberate device — Keonjhar and Telkoi both lie in Keonjhar district, so partial knowledge is being tested against precise knowledge, and the safe assumption in that pair is the one that shares its name with the district, since a district headquarters seat is the more likely berth for a four-term senior leader. Neither move is a guarantee, but together they turn a one-in-four guess into a considered choice, which is what matters on a paper with negative marking of one-third for a wrong answer.

• Mohan Charan Majhi represents the Keonjhar assembly constituency in Keonjhar district, Odisha, winning it in 2000, 2004, 2019 and 2024
• In 2024 he polled 87,815 votes for a vote share of 47.05 per cent
• He was sworn in as the fifteenth Chief Minister of Odisha on 12 June 2024, succeeding Naveen Patnaik, who had been Chief Minister since March 2000
• He is the first person from the Santal tribal community to become Chief Minister of Odisha; his deputies are Kanak Vardhan Singh Deo and Pravati Parida
• Hinjili, in Ganjam district, is Naveen Patnaik's long-held constituency; Telkoi is a different constituency within Keonjhar district itself
• A Chief Minister is appointed by the Governor under Article 164, and the Council of Ministers is collectively responsible to the State Legislative Assembly

• Picking the predecessor's constituency — Hinjili belongs to Naveen Patnaik, not to Majhi
• Stopping at the district; Keonjhar district contains Telkoi as well as the Keonjhar seat itself
• Confusing the date of the election with the date of taking office; Majhi was sworn in on 12 June 2024

BPSC asks the political current-affairs of other states as one-line identifications — who became Chief Minister, from which seat, on what date — and it draws the distractors from the same state, often from the same district, so the required precision is high. UPSC does not ask who represents which constituency; it asks the constitutional office instead — under which article a Chief Minister is appointed, to whom the Council of Ministers is responsible, or what happens if a minister is not a member of the legislature.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Under which Article of the Constitution is the Chief Minister of a State appointed by the Governor ?

  • (a)Article 155
  • (b)Article 163
  • (c)Article 164
  • (d)Article 167

  Answer(c) Article 164 — it also provides that other ministers are appointed on the Chief Minister's advice and that the Council of Ministers is collectively responsible to the Legislative Assembly; Article 155 covers the appointment of the Governor.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Whom did Mohan Charan Majhi succeed as Chief Minister of Odisha in June 2024 ?

  • (a)Naveen Patnaik
  • (b)Giridhar Gamang
  • (c)Hemananda Biswal
  • (d)Janaki Ballabh Patnaik

  Answer(a) Naveen Patnaik — Chief Minister continuously from March 2000 until the change of government in June 2024.