"Shashank Sekhar Bhokta has filed nomination papers in four sets. He is the only candidate to have filed papers before the deadline today. There is no other candidate," Secretary of the Assembly Secretariat Sushil Kumar Singh said here.
Among the prominent proposers of the MLA from Sarath constituency, were Chief Minister Hemant Soren and minister and Congress leader Rajendra Pratap Singh.
Bhokta's nomination came after C P Singh resigned from the post of Speaker on July 19 soon after the Hemant Soren-led government won the trust vote.
"We don't have numbers to win. We would have pondered over it if any other Opposition MLA came forward to contest. But nobody had come," Jharkhand Vikas Morcha (Prajatantric) Legislature Party Leader Pradip Yadav said when asked why the Opposition shied away from the contest.
He, however, said as per convention the Speaker's post has been unanimous.