Jammu, April 13 (IANS): Haji Anayat Ali and Jehangir Hussain Mir were on Sunday unanimously elected as chairman and deputy chairman of the Jammu and Kashmir legislative council.

Announcing the result, a statement by the returning officer for the election in the upper house said the motion for election of the chairman and deputy chairman was moved by Education Minister Naeem Akhtar, who is also the leader of the house, and seconded by Ramesh Arora.

Felicitating the newly-elected chairman and deputy chairman, Deputy Chief Minister Nirmal Singh said that the PDP-BJP coalition government created history by electing the deputy chairman from an opposition party which was never witnessed earlier.

Similarly, he said, the deputy speaker of the assembly was also elected from the opposition.

"We decided to give the position of the main opposition to the National Conference in the lower house and to the Congress in the upper house, because the coalition between the BJP and the PDP is not to rule the state, but to work for larger goal of bringing the state out of the morass," he said.