In the last general election BJP won 10 seats and got 18 % votes of the total vote registered which are 3,874,739 votes. BJP did better and got 4 additional seats.
In January 2016, Basant Panda become the State President replacing KV Singhdeo. Year 2017 was for organizing and activating booth level workers. The BJP, which had won just 36 seats in the 2012 panchayat polls, put up an impressive show by winning 297 seats in the 2017 polls.
Projection of Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan as the chief ministerial candidate become clear and many factions in BJP too arises. Many senior leaders like Bijoy Mahapatra, Dillip Ray have been sidelined. Though Jual Oram’s group has been sidelined yet the group is showing itself intact. KV Singhdeo was also unhappy when he was replaced as the President of the state unit.
The popularity of Modi has increased with percentage of vote share of BJP in Odisha; particularly in youth voters. No doubt, Dharmendra Pradhan has command over the party unit and able to channelize his unit throughout the state yet not looking so strong enough to counter the internal conflict as well as BJD.
Saket Sreebhushan Sahu comments on Politics and Culture
saket.sahu@gmail.com
