Bhubaneswar, Feb. 14: An upbeat BJP today attributed its impressive showing in the first phase of the panchayat polls to "the desire of people in the state for a big change".
Union petroleum minister Dharmendra Pradhan, who has positioned himself as the face of the BJP in the state, said: "It was also the anger of people against the Naveen Patnaik government's misrule. The people see the BJP as the alternative."
However, BJD leaders maintained that the party continued to be number one in terms of the seats won.
"The BJD is number one in the first phase and will maintain the position in the next four phases. We continue to have the popular mandate. The BJP has appropriated Congress votes and it should not be jubilant about it," said BJD spokesperson Shashi Bhushan Behera.
Another BJD spokesperson Rabi Narayan Nanda said: "The BJP and the Congress are hand-in-glove and the Congress had transferred its votes to the BJP."
Congress leaders Narasingha Mishra and Suresh Routray, on the other hand, attributed the victories of the BJD and the BJP to "money power".
The BJD has bagged 96 zilla parishad seats, the BJP 64 and the Congress 11. Five have gone to others. The result of 12 other seats are yet to be known. In the first phase, elections were held for 188 seats, while voting for electing sarpanchs, and samiti members were held in 1,506 gram panchayats. However, these are not official figures, which will only be made available on February 25 after the fifth phase of polling is over on February 21.
The BJP's performance has been quite impressive considering it had held only seven zilla parishad seats in the places where elections were held on Monday.
The BJD and the Congress have reasons to be worried about the rise of the BJP. In the last panchayat polls held in 2012, after the first phase of polling BJD had won 149 zilla parishad seats, the BJP 7 and the Congress 22. Nine had gone to others.
The BJD has been wiped out in Kalahandi district and its performance is dismal in the tribal-dominated Mayurbhanj district.
Urban housing development minister Puspendra Singh, who represents Kalahandi, failed to check BJP's growth in the district. After being exposed for its failure to provide minimum basic health facilities to the people in the case of Daana Majhi, who had to shoulder his wife's body for nearly 14km, the BJD suffered badly. In the first phase of the polls, BJP captured all the nine seats in the district.
In Mayurbhanj, the BJP won 12 seats out of 15. While two seats went to the BJD, the JMM bagged one.
Here, the ruling party paid the price for the ongoing tussle between sports minister Sudam Marandi and deputy speaker Sananda Marandi.
In Baragarh, the BJD suffered a setback though two of its stalwarts - Rajya Sabha member Prasanna Acharya and textile minister Shenagini Chhuria - represent the district. Here the BJP bagged five seats, while the BJD got two. The BJP also dealt a blow to industry minister Debi Prasad Mishra's constituency by bagging four seats.
In Balangir district, the BJP did fairly well. Of the seven seats there, the BJP got six. In Balangir, the Congress has reasons to worry as it failed to retain its seat in a district represented Opposition leader Narasingha Mishra. In Satyabadi, the constituency of Pradesh Congress Committee president Prasad Harichandan, the Congress failed to win any seat.
The BJP won two seats in Odagaon to make inroads in Nayagarh, which is the constituency of law minister Arun Sahu. In Jharsuguada, the BJD could not even open its account. However, in Nuapada constituency, the turf of state BJP president Basant Panda, the BJD has won all the seats.
