BJP needs to reinvent ways to counter BJD in Odisha: Muralidhar

BHUBANESWAR: The BJP needs to reinvent strategies to counter the challenges posed by the BJD leadership to win elections and the confidence of people, said senior party leader P Muralidhar Rao here on Wednesday.

Admitting that it has been a long time but the party has not been able to secure power on its own in Odisha, the former national general secretary of the saffron party said Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has mastered the art of maintaining a cordial relationship with the Narendra Modi government at the Centre while at the same time maintaining a distance from BJP in the State.

On a day’s visit to the State to address a session of the party’s training camp at Puri on the defence policy of the Central government, Rao in conversation with select reporters here said winning elections is an art. “Parties in power and Opposition are constantly encountering challenges of different nature. Patnaik has been deftly handling all the challenges and converting them into opportunity,” he said. 

Rao cited the recent election of Droupadi Murmu as President of India and the role Patnaik played by offering his party’s support to the NDA nominee. “Since Patnaik is an astute politician, the State BJP has to reinvent new ways to outsmart the BJD at ground-level and its leadership at the State-level to win elections,” he said. 

When pointed out that the common perception in Odisha is that the BJP is not aggressive against the ruling dispensation as in West Bengal and Telangana, Rao said, in politics there is no straight line to success and straight answers to all questions. He said, “Election is an art of war which Naveen has mastered well. But nothing is impossible. We had to wait for a long time in Karnataka to succeed. The same thing will happen in Odisha also.” 

On leadership vacuum of BJP in Odisha, Rao who has been recently given the charge of poll-bound Madhya Pradesh said such question is not asked till the party comes to power. “Devendra Fadnavis was not a very known figure till he became Chief Minister of Maharashtra. Same was the case in Haryana and Tripura,” he said. Responding to a query on rising inflation in the country, Rao said it is a fact but this has neither affected the party nor the larger image of Prime Minister Modi.