Congress Member Parliament (MP) from Ludhiana Ravneet Singh Bittu has been given a major responsibility at the national level. The Congress national president Sonia Gandhi on Thursday gave Bittu a temporary charge of the party’s leader in the Lok Sabha.

Bittu will discharge the role for the ongoing Budget session of the Parliament.

The appointment came after Adhir Ranjan Chowdhry, the leader of Congress in Lok Sabha, had to leave for campaigning in the upcoming state elections. Bittu is party’s chief whip in the Lok Sabha.

With Deputy Leader of Congress in Lok Sabha Gaurav Gogoi also busy with Assam polls, Bittu would have to lead the party’s strategy in the lower house where legislative business remains held up due to the Opposition’s demands to suspend all work and discuss fuel price rise first.

Only recently, Bittu has been at the forefront of the farmers’ agitation, protesting in Delhi’s Jantar Mantar and was attacked during a demonstration at the Singhu border on the outskirts of the capital.

The three-time MP from Punjab, Bittu was first elected to the Lok Sabha in 2009 from the Sri Anandpur Sahib constituency and then from Ludhiana in 2014 and 2019.

Bittu, the grandson of former Punjab Chief Minister Beant Singh who was assassinated in 1995, was appointed whip of the Congress in the Lok Sabha in August.

A youth leader from Punjab, he was the first leader to be elected in the Punjab Youth Congress through the democratic elections which Rahul Gandhi introduced.

Punjab Congress congratulated Bittu for his appointment on Twitter. “Congratulations to Member of Parliament from Ludhiana @RavneetBittu Ji for being appointed as Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha,” read the tweet by Punjab Congress’ official Twitter handle.

In 2009, as president of the Punjab Youth Congress, he started a campaign against drug addiction and helped organize a hunger strike in 2011 for setting up a Drug Prevention Board in the State.