Finally this is an ‘echo’ that would surely annoy the ruling BJD party here, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the first time in Odisha post 2014 general elections at Baleswar Vikash Parv very subtly quipped, “Will the Bharat Mata Ki Jai reverberate loud enough to be heard in Bhubaneswar (read as seat of BJD Government)IJ”
More so, the Prime Minister’s aligning of ‘development’ with BJP and the vice versa, and lampooning and aligning of all ‘populist’ Governments as ‘Khilona and tukere (dolls and dole) dene wali sarkars’ with other non-BJP Governments is an oblique hint clearly dropped at BJD’s door step - when the State Government here is on dole spree schemes like Aahar. This gets crystal clear further when the Prime Minister unambiguously linked Odisha’s lopsided development to BJP’s not in the ruling seat here.
More salvos were aimed at BJD, when the Prime Minister asked people, “Kya kabhi koi sarkar yahan bhi aapko hisab dene ke liya aap ke pass aayi hai (had any Government ever come here to give their balance-sheets to you)”, when only a few days ago BJP’s Bijay Mahapatra attacked the BJD Government here terming the review exercises after two year’s completion of the fourth term as ‘farce’.
If the Prime Minister’s speech at Baleswar is read through political lens, then on the face it appears as if Modi is listing out his Government’s initiatives during last two year and its salient features and effects on BPl mass across the country.
But comparably looked at, his stress on maternal and infant mortality, Janani Suraksha Yojana (JSY), proper hospitals, doctors, teachers, Government schools and education system, health check-up in schools, school toilets, malnutrition et all appears as if a well-briefed Prime Minister is keeping his fingers on the BJD Government’s raw nerves - especially post last year’s brouhaha over Cuttack infant deaths, where most infants who died were from north Odisha and its link surfaced then to higher incidences of low Birth Weight (lBW) babies born in north Odisha, recent incidents of mothers delivering on roads in remote parts of the State and persistence of large-scale teacher and doctor vacancies here.
In a nutshell, Prime Minister Modi in his inimitable style has delivered for the State BJP, what they are fervently hoping for to get a big-bang launch pad to declare war on ruling BJD Government, coincidentally, when Panchayat elections are barely a year away. And when all these slip-ups grip rural Odisha, the BJP could well play up these audio-video clips of Prime Minister’s speech at Baleswar to its hilt to shore up support for BJP, feel political watchers who are well-versed with the knowhow of BJP’s campaign style elsewhere nationally.
Keeping in mind Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s ‘Sahenshah’ taunt for anniversary bash at New delhi, Prime Minister Modi for a dozen times here reminded people of being only a ‘Pradhan Sevak’ and enunciated the ‘cause’ behind ‘celebration’. “Intention behind Garibi Hatao was not wrong but the means to achieve had gone wrong. The policy shift now with people’s active participation brings to fore a changing time, hence celebration,” Modi reasoned.