Bhubaneswar (09/06/2024): Former Odisha Chief Minister's close aide VK Pandian announced retirement from active politics on Sunday. The announcement comes days after the BJD faced massive setback in Odisha Assembly and Lok Sabha elections. Pandian, an IAS officer of 2000 batch, has served as the private secretary to Patnaik for more than two decades.

In 2023, he joined the BJD after taking voluntary retirement from the bureaucracy.