Bhubaneswar: The Odisha state capital Monday witnessed hectic political activities in the run-up to the Rajya Sabha elections with the ruling BJP and opposition Congress holding separate meetings of their MLAs, while BJD-sponsored “common” candidate, urologist Datteswar Hota, hitting campaign trail.
The ruling BJP is set to win two seats in the March 16 Rajya Sabha elections, and the opposition BJD is certain to bag one, while all eyes are on the fourth seat, where Hota was fielded by the Naveen Patnaik-led party and supported by the Congress. The BJP is yet to name its candidates.
The BJP MLAs held a meeting at Chief Minister Mohan Charan Majhi’s official residence as the preparation for the RS polls enters the final phase and the last date of filing nomination is March 5. Apart from lawmakers, the meeting was attended by Deputy CM Pravati Parida, state party president Momohan Samal and others.
“We held a detailed discussion on the RS polls to chalk out the strategy. The party’s Parliamentary Board will decide on candidates,” said BJP MLA Ashok Mohanty after the meeting.
At the meeting, the saffron party legislators signed on the nomination papers as proposers for three prospective nominees, signalling that the party may field three candidates even as it has numbers to ensure the victory of two candidates.
The BJP MLAs were asked to remain present in the assembly March 5 when the party candidates file their nomination papers, sources said.
According to the Rajya Sabha arithmetic for the state, one candidate needs at least 30 first preference votes to win a seat. The BJP has 79 MLAs and the support of three Independents, taking the total backing of 82 MLAs. Therefore, the party can easily secure two seats by getting 60 first preference votes and will still have a surplus of 22 votes.
“Our party will field three candidates, and we are confident of winning them,” said Santosh Khatua, another BJP MLA, who attended the meeting.
The win of the third candidate meant cross-voting or defections from other parties.
Senior BJP leaders including state president Manmohan Samal remained silent on the number of candidates and the strategy to win the polls. “Our Parliamentary Board will take the final decision,” Samal told reporters.
The Congress Legislature Party also held a meeting chaired by its leader Rama Chandra Kadam at a hotel here, where Hota appealed to all the MLAs to support him in the polls.
“We welcomed Dr Hota at the CLP meeting, and he appealed to all to support his candidature,” said OPCC president Bhakta Charan Das.
Twelve of the 14 Congress MLAs attended the meeting. The two absentees are Ramesh Jena and Sofia Firdous. “They are on the way to the meeting and have given consent to go by the CLP decision,” senior MLA Taraprasad Bahinipati said.
“I requested all the Congress MLAs to support my candidature. By profession, I am a doctor. If I get elected as a Member of Rajya Sabha, I will certainly serve the people of the state,” Hota told reporters after meeting the Congress MLAs.
Stating that he will also personally meet each Congress MLA, including Jena and Firdous, Hota expressed confidence that party legislators would extend their support to him.
Apart from the 18 surplus votes of BJD, Hota expects to get the support of 14 Congress MLAs and one lawmaker of the CPI(M). Together, he is expecting 33 votes against the requirement of 30 first preference votes to win the polls.
In the 147-member Odisha Assembly, the BJD has 48 MLAs after the suspension of two of its members in January. After electing its first candidate, Dr Santrup Misra, the BJD will have 18 surplus votes which is expected to go in favour of Hota.
The Rajya Sabha election is necessitated as four MPs from Odisha are scheduled to retire April 2. The retiring members are Niranjan Bishi and Munna Khan of the BJD, and Sujeet Kumar and Mamata Mohanta of the BJP.
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