The Biju Janata Dal (BJD) has used Biju Patnaik’s name to remain in monopoly status for sixteen long years. The ‘Conch’ party commands such mass trust that even the worst among human creatures can win elections in this party ticket. But alas! Most BJD leaders do not know much about the legendary figure on whose name they live like monarchs.
Some time ago, most of the BJD leaders had fumbled nervously answering questions asked by a newspaper. Strangely, only a very few did know how many times Biju Patnaik was Chief Minister and whether he was the eldest or the youngest son of his family and whether or not he was a graduate. Most of the BJD front-liners said Bijubabu dreamt big for Odisha but had no clue to what his dream was. Some fools, including Ministers, had pleaded to have their names kept secret to avoid public embarrassment. Ordinary MlAs were more honest than Ministers. Central Bhubaneswar MlA Bijay Mohanty kept resorting to ‘phonofriend’ techniques, pestering a senior MlA for help and proudly answered that Bijubabu had supported RN Singh Deo to become the Chief Minister, to which most other know-all MlAs agreed merrily despite the fact that Biju Patnaik had vehemently opposed the Swatantra Party leader Singh Deo.
BJD general secretary Narendra Swain was perhaps the only one to know the right answers. Singh Deo had retaliated by provoking the Khanna Commission appointed to probe corruption allegations against Biju Patnaik. However, the two leaders joined hands in the late 1970s to provide a non-Congress Government under Biswanath Das. MlA Alekh Jena screeched several times that Rajkishore Patnaik was the father of Biju Patnaik who quit the Congress and resigned as the Chief Minister because the Union Government was opposing development of Odisha.
Very amusingly, former MlA Sipra Mallick said Bijubabu had graduated from the Calcutta University and reserved 35% seats for women in the Panchayati Raj system. Sipra madam, daughter of veteran leader and close Biju-associate Prahlad Mallick, also said emphatically that Biju Patnaik had instituted the Kalinga Prize to honour achievers in the fields of social service and healthcare!
MlA Subrat Tarai agreed joyously with Sipra that Biju had graduated from the Calcutta University but founded the Kalinga Prize to popularise commerce. The majority failed to answer for what the Kalinga Prize was instituted. Tarai said further that Bijubabu had to resign as Chief Minister under the ‘Jayaprakash Plan’. He did not hear of any Kamaraj.
MlA Pritiranjan Ghadai tried to escape thrice by saying he did not want to talk about personal lives of big people, pleading severally to stop recording his replies. MlA Rajendra Dholkia: ‘Biju Patnaik was Chief Minister only once in his lifetime.’ Minister Pradeep Panigrahi: ‘Biju Patnaik’s wife Gyan came from Jammu and Kashmir.’
Answers on Biju Patnaik’s academic qualification appeared equally weird. While many said the late leader was an aeronautical engineer, some including the theatrical Aurobinda Dhali believed he was just an ordinary graduate, some argued that Bijubabu was an undergraduate. loudmouth MlA Samir Dash said Biju was an aeronautical engineer. Dhali jumped in again, saying Biju had founded the ‘Utkal Airways’.
MlA Prafulla Samal had nearly fainted seeing the questionnaire, but MlA Sanjeeb Sahu was honest to say he knew little about Biju Patnaik. Praful Samal proposed these questions to be put to Bijubabu’s contemporary Bhabani Charan Patnaik. Samal felt it was bad to drag him into the ‘Biju-related’ quiz. Deputy Speaker Sananda Marandi said Biju resigned as CM in the 1960s because the Congress Government opposed development of Odisha. Interestingly, some also said former CM Biren Mitra was Biju’s business partner. The best answer came from a senior MlA: “Bijubabu made a major contribution to the freedom struggle of Burma”. Yet another senior fellow said, “He fought for the independence of Thailand”. No one uttered ‘Indonesia’ once.
Biju Patnaik was a Ravenshaw College dropout who became a pilot in the Royal Indian Air Force to head the air transport command during the Second World War. Indonesia-supporter Jawaharlal Nehru had spotted Biju as a daring young patriotic pilot. So, he sent him to help Indonesians when the Dutch attempted to quell their independence, on July 21, 1947. President Sukarno was keen that former Prime Minister Sjahrir attend the Inter-Asia Conference organised by Nehru to foment international public opinion against the colonial Dutch masters. Biju and wife Gyan flew to Java and brought Sultan Sjahrir out on a Dakota to India via Singapore on July 24, 1947. For this act of bravery, Biju was given an honorary citizenship in Indonesia after being awarded the ‘Bhoomi Putra’, the highest Indonesian award. Again in 1996, when Indonesia was celebrating its 50th Independence Day, Biju was given the ‘Bintang Jasa Utama’. The predominantly Muslim community named their national airlines after ‘Garuda’, the mythical mount of lord Vishnu, on Biju’s advice.
Shortly after Independence when Pakistani tribesman invaded Kashmir, Nehru requested Biju to airlift the first seventeen Indian soldiers from the 1st Sikh Regiment and put them in Srinagar on October 27, 1947.
Biju Patnaik believed in socialistic federalism. His strong advocacy for equal resources to all Indian States made him popular among the masses.
Biju won the Odisha Assembly seat from North Cuttack. In 1961, he was elected State Congress president and he organised victory in 82 of 140 seats and became CM on June 23, 1961 at the age of 45. On October 2, 1963, he resigned the post under the Kamaraj Plan to revitalise the Congress.
Biju was close to Indira Gandhi. However, they split in 1969 over some dispute relating to the Presidential election. He quit the Congress and formed regional party Utkal Congress. But in the 1971 Assembly polls, though his party did reasonably well, he himself lost from all five constituencies. Patnaik reestablished contact with old friend Jayaprakash Narayan and plunged into the JP movement as it gained momentum in 1974. Emergency was declared in 1975 and Biju was one of the first to be arrested among a few other opposing leaders.
Biju was an incomparable entrepreneur who set up the first Indian electro-resistance welding-based steel tube manufacturing plant Kalinga Tubes in Odisha. Jindal Steel founder OP jindal was a trader in the Kalinga Tubes. Bijubabu also established the Odisha Textile Mill, a kerosene-run refrigerator plant, Kalinga Airlines, Kalinga Iron Works and Kalinga Refractories. By 1951, he had established the international Kalinga Prize for popularisation of science and technology and entrusted the responsibility of selecting its achievers to the UNESCO.
It was Biju Patnaik who put Odisha in the world map as a desired business destination by putting up the deepest seaport at Paradip, the Odisha Aviation Centre, Bhubaneswar Airport, the Cuttack-Jagatpur Mahanadi highway bridge, Regional College of Education, Engineering College, Rourkela, Sainik School Bhubaneswar, Orissa University of Agriculture and Technology, Talcher Thermal Power Station, Balimela Hydel Project, HAl Sunabeda and the Choudwar and Barbil industrial belts. His Kalinga Cup for football has long been assassinated by the countywide cricket menace.
Odisha salutes Biju Patnaik in his centenary year but deeply laments that the BJD biggies do not know him just well enough despite eating on his legacy for survival. May lord Jagannath enlighten and reform the greedy fools to make sure Biju ‘s soul is smiling from up somewhere!
(The writer is a core member of Transparency International, Odisha)