Bhubaneswar, Sept. 25: BJD president and chief minister Naveen Patnaik today announced Rita Sahu, wife of the late Subal Sahu, as the party's candidate from Bijepur Assembly constituency.

The seat had fallen vacant following the death of Congress MLA Sahu last month.

Besides naming Rita as the Bijepur candidate, Naveen also announced the party's Jan Sampark Padayatra from October 2 to 11.

Two days ago, Rita and her two sons had joined the BJD, along with their supporters. Sources said Naveen swiftly announced his decision to make Sahu the BJD candidate after the party's vice-president Prasanna Acharya yesterday made a statement that the party was yet to take a decision on the issue.

Acharya had been conspicuous by his absence at the programme to welcome the Sahus to the BJD.

Subal Sahu had defeated Acharya in the 2014 general elections.

After the chief minister's announcement today, Acharya said the party would win the Bijepur election comfortably.

However, the local BJD unit in Bargarh did not hide its displeasure. Party leader Pravat Aditya Mishra said: 'It's an injustice to us. It's not the real BJD that was given ticket.'

Former Bijepur MLA Ashok Kumar Panigrahi was harsher in his reaction. He even wrote to the chief minister today saying he would intensify the fight against him and the party.

'The decision to give Rita Sahu a ticket is taken keeping the narrow political benefit in mind and the bigger interests of the state were ignored,' said Panigrahi.

He also stirred a controversy saying how he had got the chief minister's tacit support in the general elections of 2014 even though he had fought as a rebel candidate against the BJD's official candidate Prasanna Acharya.