TNI Bureau: Senior leader of Odisha and former Union Minister Srikant Jena returned to Congress once again ahead of the election in the State.

Jena, who was suspended from the party for his anti-party activities in January 2019, rejoined the grand old party in the presence of Odisha Congress in-charge Ajoy Kumar and party leader Vineet Punia.

This came a month after he resigned from all party posts, openly challenging the leadership of then state Congress president Niranjan Patnaik. He was a member of the executive committee and the state unit election committee of the Congress. However, even after being expelled from the party, he did not make any adverse comments against the Congress.

Jena was elected three times as MLA and four times as MP. He was the Minister of State (Independent charge) for Chemicals & Fertilisers and Statistics & Programme Implementation in the Manmohan Singh ministry and Union Minister of State, Small Scale Industry, Agro and Rural Industries in the V P Singh ministry.