The Congress, BJD and the BJP have now laid focus on the by-election in the Bijepur Assembly constituency which is necessitated following the death of Congress MlA Subal Sahu recently.
The Bijepur constituency consists of three blocks such as Barpali, Bijepur and Gaisilet of Bargarh district. late Sahu was a three-time MlA from Bijepur.
Any moment, the Election Commission would declare a date for the by-poll. In the 2014 election, Sahu from Congress and Prasanna Acharya from BJD had a neck-and-neck contest and Sahu had won by a thin margin of 458 votes. The BJP had been in the third slot.
Former BJD MlA Ashok Panigrahi had played the spoilsport for Acharya. After denied a ticket, he had contested the poll as an Independent candidate. Since the suspension of Panigrahi from BJD, the party had been weak and it was Congress that kept winning for three consecutive times.
In last Panchayat election, out of six ZP zone, the BJP has won five and only one seat has gone to the hand of the BJD under Bijepur constituency. In Bargarh district, there are one each Rajya Sabha and lok Sabha members and two State Ministers. So the by-election will be a tough contest among the three parties. The BJP has won maximum ZP seats in Bargarh district in the PRI polls. MP candidate Subash Chauhan was defeated in very low margin vote in 2014. So it would be a prestige issue for the BJP.
late Sahu from Congress had got 53,290 (32.1 per cent) votes and BJD’s Acharya had got 52,832(31.88 per cent) votes in 2014 election.
Jayashankar Pattanayak from BJP had got 30,001 (18.10 per cent) votes. Selection of right candidates will determine the victory for the three parties in the by poll, said observers.