BJD rift wide open in Angul district

TALCHER: The rift in Angul district unit of BJD became wide open after cancellation of a party meet at Talcher on Sunday. The feud within the party has come to the fore at a time when BJP is rapidly gaining ground at Talcher, the home town of Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan.

As per reports, local ruling party MLA Braja Kishore Pradhan had convened an executive body meeting of Talcher Nagar BJD on Sunday. Among the invitees were Angul district BJD president Rajanikant Singh, Dhenkanal MP Tathagat Satpathy and Health Minister Pratap Jena. However, Pallahara MLA Mahesh Sahu and former BJD chief whip Rabi Narayan Pani were not invited to the meet.

Sources said the news of exclusion of Sahu and Pani evoked strong resentment among BJD workers. They protested and demanded to know why Sahu, Pani and also Talcher Municipal Chairperson were not invited to the meeting. Amid reports of protest by local BJD workers, Minister Jena cancelled his visit to Talcher on the plea that he was preoccupied with some work.

Tapan Maharana, a BJD worker, said the rank and file of the local unit of the party were peeved over exclusion of Sahu from the invitees’ list despite he being an MLA and son of the soil.
On the other hand, city BJD president Asif Khan denied that the meeting was cancelled due to party infighting. The meet was called off as the Health Minister was busy supervising cyclone situation in the State, he claimed.

According to sources, the ruling BJD, which captured five Assembly seats in the last general elections, is now a divided house with multiple factions in the party. The party infighting had affected the outcome in the last panchayat polls in which BJD managed to grab only one of the four Zilla Parishad seats  in Talcher.