Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has picked Mohammad Ali Arafat as state minister for information and broadcasting.

The portfolios were distributed after the oath-taking ceremony at Bangabhaban this evening.

Arafat is a two-time MP, having been twice elected from the Dhaka-17 constituency as an Awami League nominee in the 11th and 12th parliaments respectively. He entered the 11th parliament after winning a by-election on July 17 last year on Awami League ticket.

He is also a member of the Awami League's central working committee.

Over the years, he has been key asset for the Awami League, in particular as regards the party's political communications and foreign relations functions.

Arafat is known as an academic, social-advocate, and politician.

Arafat is a faculty at the Canadian University of Bangladesh's School of Business. His academic interests include small businesses and their relations with economic growth, capital, connectivity, among others.

He is also the chairman of the Dhaka-based not-for-profit social-advocacy organisation, the Shuchinta Foundation. The foundation has, among others, done extensive advocacy work in poverty eradication in Bangladesh through entrepreneurship development.

Arafat holds advanced business degrees from Texas A&M University at Prairie View and the Oklahoma State University.