Krishna Dhital of the CPN (Maoist Centre) has been elected Gandaki Assembly speaker on Saturday.

A motion calling to elect Dhital as a speaker received 32 votes. A total of 58 lawmakers were present in today’s meeting of the 60-member assembly.

A total of 21 provincial assembly members from the UML, eight from the CPN (Maoist Centre), two from the Rastriya Prajatantra Party and Deepak Manange, who had joined the CPN (Unified Socialist) recently, voted in favour of Dhital.

Provincial assembly member Phanindra Devkota tabled the motion to elect Dhital as a speaker. The motion was seconded by Roshan Bahadur Gaha, provincial chief whip of the UML.

Dhital was elected from Gorkha-1(1) in the November polls.

Likewise, the motion calling to elect Saraswati Aryal Tiwari of the Nepali Congress as a speaker received only 26 votes.

As per the provincial assembly regulations, the assembly shall elect its speaker within 15 days of its first meeting.