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Regular-article-logo Saturday, 05 July 2025

Violence mars chairman polls

Oram faces setback

SUBHASHISH MOHANTY Published 13.03.17, 12:00 AM
The Election Commission office in Bhubaneswar. Picture by Ashwinee Pati

Bhubaneswar, March 12: Union tribal affairs minister Jual Oram today received a setback after failing to ensure that the BJP bagged the zila parishad chairman post in his home district Sundargarh.

To keep the BJP out of power, the Congress today joined hands with the BJD to ensure that the latter won the chairman seat. The CPI and George Sena, the local outfit working for upliftment of tribal people, also lent their support to the BJD.

In Sundargarh, the BJP bagged 13 seats in the 35-member zila parishad, and Oram put his best effort to bring the party to power in the district council. However, the BJD, which bagged 14 zila parishad seats, polled 21 votes with the support of five Congress zila parishad members.

Election to the chairman post witnessed a string of violence in three districts - Koraput, Sambalpur and Rayagada.

In Koraput, the BJD witnessed serious differences on choosing the chairperson candidate for the district. A section of party workers burnt the party flag there. District unit president Jayram Pangi alleged that money had played a big role in selection of the chairman. Pangi also suspended the Koraput zila parishad chairman candidate, Dumri Khila, who was replaced by Prabhu Jali, a candidate supported by his rival group and BJD Rajya Sabha member N. Bhaskar Reddy. The BJD won 24 out of 29 zila parishad seats in Koraput. In a late development, party president Naveen Patnaik suspended Pangi for anti-party activities.

In Sambalpur, an infighting surfaced among the BJP leaders while electing the chairman for the zila parishad council. Party vice-president Samir Mohanty was injured in the process and the rebel candidate Radheshyam Barik, who won the polls, was suspended along with eight other zila parishad members who had voted for him. Local leader and former minister Jaynarayan Mishra and district president Nauri Nayak also faced party axe.

In Raygada, the election counting was stalled as one of the zila parishad members showed his ballot paper to a local leader. According to law, a voter is to show the ballot paper to the authorised agent of the party and not to any one else before dropping it in the ballot box. The Election Commission is looking into the issue and declaration of the result has been deferred.

In Gajapati, the BJP captured the chairman post by default even though it had no majority in the council. In the 15-member zila parishad, the BJD won six, Congress five, BJP three and Independent one seat. But, the chairperson post was reserved for an SC woman candidate. As no candidate was available for the post, the BJP nominee emerged as the surprised winner and bagged the chairman post.

Election to zila parishad chairman post was held in 28 districts. However, the decision of the Rayagada was yet to be declared. Of the 27 districts, the BJD has won in 18 districts (Angul, Balasore, Bhadrak, Boudh, Cuttack, Dhenkanal, Ganjam, Jagatsinghpur, Jajpur, Kandhamal, Kendrapara, Keonjhar, Khurda, Koraput, Nabarangpur, Nayagarh, Puri and Sundargarh), the BJP has captured eight districts (Balangir, Bargarh, Deogarh, Gajapati, Kalahandi, Mayurbhanj, Sambalpur and Subarnapur) and Jharsuguda has gone to the Congress.

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