The formal exercise to finalise list of candidates and State BJP’s possible alliance in the upcoming general elections started here on Tuesday with party’s Odisha Pravari Chandan Mitra holding meeting with the core committee and election committee members of the State unit.
Mitra, who arrived here on Monday evening, had informal talks with senior party leaders and on Tuesday on both the issues. He later held consultations with the senior party leaders in the afternoon at the State party headquarters.
Small regional parties like Odisha Jana Morcha (OJM) of Pyari Mohan Mohapatra, Ama Odisha Party (AOP) of Soumya Ranjan Patnaik, Samata Kranti Dal (SKD) of Braja Tripathy and Utkal Bharat of Kharavela Swain have evinced interest to forge alliance with the BJP to fight out both the corrupt Congress and the BJD.
According to party sources, AOP chief Soumya Ranjan Patnaik and Utkal Bharat chief Kharavela Swain met Mitra separately and had wide range of discussions on the possible alliance or seat sharing with the BJP in the State-level to defeat the corrupt BJD and the Congress.
Sources said that during the first round of the meeting, almost all the senior party leaders including the State chief KV Singh Deo were opposing the idea of forging any alliance with smaller parties and insisted on going it alone in both the loka Sabha and Assembly polls.
The State leaders insisted that instead of forging alliance with the smaller parties, the BJP should persuade them to merge with it to strengthen the mission for “Congress-free India and Odisha-free BJD.” However, a section of the party was against having any sort of talk with OJM chief Pyari Mohan Mohapatra who was instrumental in breaking the alliance with the BJD prior to the 2009 general elections. Even the entire rank and file of the State party deeply resent the idea of having alliance with Mohapatra as his assimilation would be problematic on the eve of elections.
As per the reports, the State BJP unit is not completely opposed to the idea of joining hands with Soumya Ranjan Patnaik, a former BJP leader, Braja Tripathy and Kharavel Swain.
State leaders want small parties merge with BJPSources said once Kharavel merges with the BJP, he would be fielded as the party nominee from Baleswar lok Sabha seat. Even Soumya’s name is doing the rounds for the Bhubaneswar lok Sabha seat.
Meanwhile, senior BJP leader Bijoy Mohaptra and Suresh Pujari said that the process to discuss the pros and cons of possible alliance or front is under consideration. It is too early to say any thing concrete, but the party would not compromise with its principle while finalising a political alternative, said Pujari.
During the consultation, among others, Prasanna Mishra, Manmohan Samal, Surama Padhi, Bijoy Mohaptra, Mohan Majhi and Nayan Kishore Mohanty were present.
On the other hand, the main Opposition party Congress was still undecided on its final list of candidates. The Central Screening Committee met on Tuesday for Odisha under the chairmanship of Oscar Fernandes at New Delhi to take stock of the list referred by the OPCC. PCC president Jayadev Jena told reporters after his return from New Delhi that the OPCC has submitted its final list for all the 147 Assembly seats to the Screening Committee which would give its approval in consultation with the Central Election Committee. However, Jena informed that the final list would be announced soon.
Similarly, the ruling BJD has resorted to a wait-and-watch policy and is likely to finalise its list of candidates for the Assembly and lok Sabha seats after the announcement of election schedule and release of list of candidates of the BJP and the Congress.