Congress leader and former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda was on Saturday appointed as the leader of the Haryana Congress Legislature Party. Hooda will also be the Leader of Opposition in the assembly by virtue of being appointed the CLP leader, announced senior Congress leader and AICC Haryana in-charge Ghulam Nabi Azad today.

The newly-elected MLAs had left the decision to choose the leader of the legislative party to Congress President Sonia Gandhi. On Friday,the first meeting of the newly-elected MLAs was held at the Congress headquarters in Sector 9 in Chandigarh under the chairmanship of state President and MP Kumari Selja.

Hailing Hooda for his efforts in Haryana assembly election,Azad said that despite the short time he got, he ensured a good performance by the party in the poll.

In the recently concluded Haryana assembly election, BJP won40 seats in the 90-member assembly while JJP bagged 10 seats in its debutpolls. Congress won 31 seats in the state. Eight seats went to Independents including Haryana Lokhit Party's Gopal Kanda.

On October 27, Manohar Lal Khattar took oath as the Chief Minister of Haryana where the BJP formed a government in alliance with the newly formed Jannayak Janta Party (JJP) led by Dushyant Chautala (31), who tookoath as Deputy Chief Minister.

Khattar, 65, will be heading the second Bharatiya JanataParty (BJP) government of the state, which was formed on November 1, 1966.