Five-time MLA and veteran Adivasi leader Hrushikesh Naik joined the Congress with thousands of his supporters at a 'Congress Mahamishran' held at Rajnagar village under Patna Assembly Constituency of Keonjhar district.
Before the programme, former PCC President Niranjan Patnaik who was present on the occasion, was accorded a warm welcome by the villagers with women greeting him by washing his feet with turmeric water.
Former PCC president Jayadev Jena and other Congress leaders were in the dais. Patnaik criticised both BJP and BJD and said that Keonjhar which is giving highest revenue to the State and Centre has been betrayed.
He said that both the BJD and BJP have done nothing but are busy in competing with each other for falsely taking credit of free PDS but in reality, it is the brain child of Congress which had enacted laws for right to food when Manmohan Singh was the Prime Minister.
He categorically attacked the BJD Government for not completing the Kanpur irrigation project which was started by the Congress Government in the year 1984. He also attacked the Naveen Patnaik Government for shifting the proposed Arcelor Mittal steel plant from Patna, Keonjhar to Kendrapara. He said the Dharanidhar Medical College has been built of the DMF. He took a jibe at BJP by asking the audience if any of them had got Rs 15 lakh as promised by Narendra Modi in 2014 election or if any of them got any employment as promised by Modi to create 2 crore jobs.
Naik said elected representatives have lost their dignity in the BJD and he is disgusted with bureaucratic rule in the State. Similarly, BJP is creating all sorts of violence and working against the poor , Adivasis and minority community people. Under the above circumstances,he preferred to return back to Congress, Naik disclosed.
Jena in his speech said people have already realised the misrules of the BJP and BJD and how they have made tacit understanding with each other to loot the people of the State. He vowed to continue a crusade till the end dictatorship of Narendra Modi and misrule of Naveen Patnaik.