The Biju Janata Dal (BJD) on Monday announced its candidates for the forthcoming bye-elections to the Baleswar Sadar and Tirtol Assembly constituencies.The party nominated Swarup Kumar Das for Baleswar Sadar and Bijaya Shankar Das for Tirtol.
Bijaya Shankar Das is the son of late MLA Bishnu Das, whose death has necessitated the Tirtol by-poll. Swarup Das is a former Baleswar Municipality Councillor while his elder brother Arup Kumar Das was the municipality’s Chairman for two terms.
Notably, the BJP had on Sunday announced its candidates Manas Kumar Dutta and Raj Kishore Behera for the by-polls in Baleswar Sadar and Tirtol, respectively. Out of the State’s three major parties, only the Congress is yet to choose its candidates.
The bye-elections are scheduled on November 3.
In another development, ahead of the by-polls, Ramakanta Bhoi, who had unsuccessfully contested the 2014 and 2019 elections from Tirtol on BJP ticket, on Monday joined the BJD at the party office here.
He joined the BJD in the presence of senior party leaders, including MLA Debi Prasad Mishra, MP Rajashree Mallick and Tirtol by-poll in-charge Debasish Samantray.Bhoi had resigned from the BJP on October 6 saying, “I am being ignored by the BJP State leadership.”Meanwhile, on Monday, BJP Tirtol candidate Rajkishore Behera filed his nomination papers at the Jagatsinghpur Additional Collector’s office.
Behera, who recently quit the Congress and joined the BJP, had unsuccessfully contested the 2009 and 2014 Assembly elections from Tirtol on Congress ticket.