The long wait for declaration of the BJP nominee for the prestigious Brahmapur Parliamentary seat came to an end on Sunday with the BJP’s Central Committee announcing the name of Ganjam district’s well-known leader Rama Chandra Panda as the candidate for the constituency, which former Prime Minister late PV Narasimha Rao had represented once.
The BJP’s rank and file here was jubilant over Panda’s candidature. When the news spread in the town, hundreds of workers, party functionaries, senior citizens and sympathisers came to Panda’s residence and congratulated him.
The people of Ganjam, particularly Brahmapur, were eagerly waiting for the announcement of Panda’s candidature, said BJP district president BK Swain. BJP youth leaders Prabhat Kiran Sadangi and N Rajendra Kumar and Sunil Kumar Sahu claimed that with Panda’s nomination the winning prospects of BJP candidates in all the seven Assembly segments under the lok Sabha constituency too have increased.
Political observers feel that with Panda’s honest public image and wide rapport with workers at the grassroots level, especially in the Chhatrapur, Gopalpur and Brahmapur Assembly segments, the BJP will surely gain in the region.
However, the delay in declaring the names of BJP candidates for three Assembly seats under the Brahmapur lok Sabha constituency, Brahmapur, Digapahandi and Chikiti is a matter of worry for the party’s rank and file.
At the same time, they feel that with the BJD nominee and sitting Brahmapur MP Siddhant Mohapatra “having lost public confidence, the fight for the lok Sabha seat this time will be a tough one between Congress nominee and former Union Minister Chandra Sekhar Sahu and Panda. Except the Digapahandi and Chikiti Assembly segments, the BJP has good shares of votes elsewhere, they said.