Unacceptable and unpopular leaders picked up as BJD candidates for the ensuing Assembly elections in the Salepur and Cuttack Sadar seats have put the party workers in the two constituencies of the district in a tizzy.
Resentment is brewing among the BJD workers in the Cuttack Sadar constituency where sitting Salepur MlA Chandrasarathi Behera is fielded in place of his father Kalindi Behera. Kalindi is said to be missing out from the BJD list for poor health although several ailing and old leaders have got BJD tickets this time.
Opposing the candidature of Chandrasarathi, many local BJD workers of Cuttack Sadar are staging protests and demanding that the constituency be represented by a son of the soil. “We are no more going to work for the leaders imported from outside,” said a BJD worker of the area, suggesting that local popular worker Prafulla Behera be given the party ticket.
On the other hand, BJD sympathisers in Salepur are also not too happy with the party nominee Prashant Behera, who is now the Cuttack Zila Parishad president and son of former Choudwar MlA Dharmananda Behera. Even Prashant’s candidature is not backed by the Salepur veteran leader Kalindi Behera, who questions as to whether people of the area know Prashant well.
Notwithstanding the fact that Kalindi’s popularity here has nosedived for encouraging family politics, he still commands respect in some parts and could be a game changer for Prashant’s electoral fortunes.
It may be mentioned that the people of the district had reposed faith in Naveen Patnaik’s BJD wholeheartedly in 2009 by electing BJD candidates in all the nine Assembly segments of the district and the lone Parliamentary seat.
But poll observers here are apprehensive that due to poor candidate selections, the BJD is likely to face electoral setbacks and its candidates; particularly in Cuttack Sadar and Salepur are likely to face opposition from party workers, the benefits of which may either go to the Congress or the BJP.