BJD dubs own leaders as Congress members

JAGATSINGHPUR: The district BJD was left red-faced after wrongly identifying its own leaders as Congress members in the party release issued on Monday evening.The BJD issued the press release after 10 Congress leaders of Tirtol joined the party in Bhubaneswar. Apart from mentioning the names of newly-inducted Congress leaders, the releases stated that Zilla Parishad president Priyadarshini Biswal and her husband Gangadhar who is Tirtol block president, also joined the ruling party. Both Priyadarshini and Gangadhar are members of BJD and are in the party since long.

The BJD release also mentioned that chairperson of Tirtol panchyat samiti Sujata Mohanty also joined the party from Congress. Sujata too is a ruling party member. Apart from the mistake in the release, BJD’s Jagatsinghpur observer Debashish Samantray mentioned these three leaders as Congress members, who had joined the ruling party, in a Facebook post.

Later, Debashish rectified his mistake. District BJD president and Jagatsinghpur MLA Prashant Muduli said the mistake was inadvertent. However, some local BJD leaders alleged that it was the handiwork of some rebels to tarnish the party and the three leaders ahead of Tirtol by-election.

On Monday, State convener of Congress SC/ST cell Debendra Mallick and former Zilla Parishad member Krushna Mallick along with eight of their supporters joined BJD in presence of the party’s organisational secretary Pranab Prakash Das, Debashish, Prasant Muduli and Jagatsinghpur MP Rajashree Mallick.

Meanwhile, BJP leader and aspirant from Tirtol Assembly constituency Ramakant Bhoi resigned from the party on Tuesday. “I am being ignored by the State leadership. Despite frequent requests, the BJP leadership has not given me importance due to which my supporters feel neglected in the party. So I resigned from BJP,” he said.Ramakant had unsuccessfully contested in 2014 and 2019 general elections on BJP ticket.