Orissa Assembly polls: Naveen’s BJD posts landslide victory

Though JB Patnaik of Congress is the longest serving chief minister of Orissa,he could not score a hat-trick. Even Naveen’s illustrious father Biju Patnaik could never score a back-to-back win.

Reacting to the historic win,Naveen said he was feeling humbled by the mandate. “The people of Orissa have voted us for our pro-poor programmes,” he said.

The party also exceeded its performance in Lok Sabha by leading in 14 of the 21 seats with rank newcomers like Siddhant Mohapatra leading in Berhampur seat ahead of union minister Chandrasekhar Sahoo of Congress by a comfortable margin.

Powered by a towering leadership of Naveen Patnaik and the populist scheme of Rs 2/kg rice,the party bettered its previous tally of 61 seats in the 2004 assembly polls. It even bettered its tally of 2000. Naveen was leading comfortably in Hinjili assembly constituency like several of his cabinet colleagues while his bete noire Bijoy Mohapatra of BJP was trailing by over 5000 votes in Patkura assembly seat.

In the Lok Sabha seats,BJD and its pre-poll allies such as Left and NCP were ahead in 14 of the 21 seats with Congress leading in 6 seats. BJD candidates Jay Panda was comfortably ahead in Kendrapara by over 50000 votes while Tathagat Satpathy was all set to win from Dhenkanal Lok Sabha constituency. There were jubilant faces in BJD office in Bhubaneswar and elsewhere in Orissa as party-workers burst crackers and distributed sweets. BJD leader AU Singh Deo said the victory was a referendum on Naveen’s clean image.

Congress which was hamstrung by a lack of strategy and leadership during the entire campaign was leading in only 27 seats. The party’s campaign was listless with its PCC president KP Singh Deo denied a ticket to fight either the assembly or Lok Sabha polls. There seemed to be confusion in the party rank and file as the party continued to tinker with its candidate list till the last moment. But Singh Deo refused to accept the losing trend of Congress. “I think we need to wait for the final results. There are several more rounds to be completed,” said Singh Deo.

BJP which was dumped by Naveen Patnaik was the biggest disappointment as its battle theme of “betrayal” was rejected by the people. Most of its big guns including its national secretary Dharmendra Pradhan,Manmohan Samal,Kharavela Swain,Juel Oram,Sameer Dey were trailing in their respective seats. The party was leading in only 11 seats in assembly polls while the party was all set to draw a blank in the Lok Sabha. But the party seems to have benefited the most out of Kandhamal where a riot last year saw 38 killings. Both of its candidates in Baliguda and G Udaygiri,the epicentre of the 2008 riots,won by handsome margin.

BJD’s win also marks the ascendancy of its chief strategist and Rajya Sabha MP Pyari Mohan Mohapatra,who was instrumental in breaking the party away from BJP just before the polls.

Mohapatra,who himself chose every single candidate for the Lok Sabha and assembly poll,seemed to have been proved right with his prediction that the party would win not less than 85 seats in the assembly and 12 seats in the Lok Sabha.