New Delhi: In Odisha, the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) is all set to retain the Padampur assembly seat in Bargarh district despite a vigorous fight from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which had launched a high-octane campaign with an eye on the 2024 state and national elections.
BJD candidate Barsha Singh Bariha, the daughter of incumbent MLA Bijay Singh Bariha, whose death had necessitated the bypoll, is leading by a margin of 38,252 votes against her nearest rival, Pradip Purohit of the BJP, as of 4.30 pm Thursday.
For both parties, Padampur has been an important battle of prestige. With the win, the BJD has demonstrated that its graph in Odisha isn’t sliding even though it has been in power for five consecutive terms. So crucial was this fight for the BJD that Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik himself hit the campaign trail — something he has not done physically since the Covid pandemic struck.
The BJD had some reason to be nervous: The BJP’s Suryabanshi Suraj had won the Dhamnagar by-election in November, polling 49 per cent of the votes. Suraj was the son of the late BJP MLA Bishnu Sethi, after whose death the seat had fallen vacant.
Dhamnagar, notably, was the BJD’s first bypoll loss since 2009. While Patnaik said he had always “expected” that the BJP would keep the seat due to the late MLA’s popularity, Union minister Dharmendra Pradhan — who is from Odisha and played a key role in the BJP campaign — claimed it reflected people’s trust in Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
If trends hold, the Padampur loss, however, will upset the applecart for the BJP, which has been taking Mission Odisha seriously ahead of the 2024 general election. The party had spared no effort in the campaign, for which it had especially deputed Pradhan to the state. Other Union ministers including Narendra Tomar and Ashwini Vaishnaw were also flown in for rallies.
Keeping the pitch high ahead of voting were raids and counter-raids by central and state agencies, and a sustained political blame game on issues such as crop insurance, a delayed railway project, and district status for Padampur.
Also read: Counter-raids & more — how BJD’s fighting to save Odisha’s Padampur seat from an aggressive BJP
A swing constituency
A rural constituency with about 2.48 lakh voters, of which over 44 per cent belong to the Scheduled Tribes and about 29 per cent to the Scheduled Castes, Padampur has swung between the BJP and the BJD in the last few elections.
The BJP’s candidate, Pradip Purohit, had defeated the late Bijay Ranjan Bariha in the 2014 assembly election by a margin of about 4,500 votes. In 2019, Bariha defeated Purohit by just over 5,000 votes.
This time, the BJD banked on a sympathy wave for candidate Barsha Singh Bariha, CM Patnaik’s presence, and a slew of welfare measures announced before the election.
The BJP’s Purohit is also a well-known face in the region, rising to prominence in the 1980s during a movement against the proposed bauxite mining activities of the Bharat Aluminium Company Ltd (BALCO).
On 5 December, the constituency registered a record turnout of over 81 per cent for voting.
‘Momentum’ has been elusive for BJP
In the run-up to the Padampur bypoll, BJP leaders claimed that the Dhamnagar victory had provided “momentum” to the party, which had lost the Balasore and Tirtol assembly bypolls in 2020. However, this narrative has now been dealt a blow with the Padampur loss.
Ever since the BJP and the BJD broke their 11-year-long alliance in 2009 over disagreements on ideology and seat-sharing, the fortunes of both changed in Odisha. While the BJD benefited electorally, the BJP’s footprint diminished significantly.
In the 2004 assembly elections, when the two parties last fought together, the BJD won only 61 seats while the BJP got 32. But in the 2009 assembly elections, when the two parties fought separately, the BJD won 103 seats and the BJP only six. In 2014, the BJD bagged 117 seats and the BJP 10. In 2019, the BJP did better, winning 23 seats, but the BJD was still way ahead with wins in 112 seats.
In the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, which took place simultaneously with the assembly polls, the BJD won 20 out of 21 seats and the BJP got one. However, the BJP marked a significant improvement in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, when it won eight seats.
However, Odisha has continued to be slippery state for the BJP when it comes to maintaining a foothold.
In the panchayat polls earlier this year, for instance, the BJD won 766 out of 852 zila parishad seats, while the BJP got only 42 — a major slide down from the 297 seats it won in 2017.
(Edited by Asavari Singh)
Also read: ‘No softening towards BJD’: Amit Shah sets 2024 Odisha road map, says BJP will form govt ‘soon’