Bhubaneswar: The Biju Janata Dal (BJD) fielded Monday deceased sitting MLA Bishnu Charan Das’s son Bijaya Shankar Das in Tirtol seat for the November 3 by-elections. The ruling party in Odisha also named Swarup Kumar Das as its candidate for bypoll to the Balasore Sadar assembly seat.
The BJP has fielded deceased sitting MLA Madan Mohan Dutta’s son Manas Kumar Dutta in the Balasore seat and Raj Kishore Behera, who has joined the party from Congress two months ago, in Tirtol constituency in Jagatsinghpur district. Bypolls to the two seats have been necessitated following the deaths of the sitting legislators.
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BJD vice-president Debiprasad Mishra announced the names of the two nominees as per the recommendations of president and Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, the party said in a statement.
Behera filed his nomination in the presence of the returning officer at the additional collector’s office in Jagatsinghpur. He had unsuccessfully contested the 2009 and 2014 Assembly elections from Tirtol on a Congress ticket.
Both the BJD and the BJP hope to draw sympathy votes for their candidates who are sons of deceased sitting MLAs.
The BJD had last year fielded Sabitri Agarwal in Patkura seat after the death of her husband and sitting MLA Bed Prakash Agarwal. She had defeated BJP nominee Bijay Mohapatra.
Tirtol is considered a traditional BJD bastion. However, the BJP is working hard to capture the seat in the bypolls.
The Congress has also geared up the process of finalising its nominees for the two seats, sources said.
