Hunted by the 2002 betrayal by a few of the party legislators, the ruling Biju Janata Dal in Orissa has issued a whip asking all its 103 legislators to caste their votes in favour of the party candidates in the ensuing Rajya Sabha polls scheduled to be held on Thursday. The MLAs have also been asked not to leave Bhubaneswar till the election process is over.
As many as 14 legislators had resorted to cross-voting in the 2002 Rajya polls to elect Independent candidate Dilip Ray.
The BJD has fielded three candidates while the Congress and BJP, the two main opposition parties, have announced their support for the independent candidate, Mr Tara Ranjan Patnaik.
With 103 seats in 147-member Assembly, the Congress can comfortably elect two members as each candidate requires at least 37 first preference votes. For the third candidate it needs eight more votes. The NCP (four seats), the CPI (one) and two independent legislators have pledged their support for the BJD. It still needs at least one more MLA’s support to get its third candidate elected.
However, the BJD leaders — who sounded confident about the fate of the third candidate last week — are now apprehensive of reaching the magic figure of 37 as the Opposition-backed Independent candidate Mr Patnaik is leaving no stone unturned to ensure his victory.
A rich industrialist, Independent candidate Mr Patnaik, apart from the 27 Congress legislators and six BJP MLAs, is likely to get support of at least three Independent candidates.
“We are confident about the winning prospects of the Independent candidate. The BJD calculation will definitely go wrong this time,” Congress Legislature Party leader Bhupinder Singh told this newspaper on Monday.
The BJD’s key strategist and Rajya Sabha member Pyarimohan Mohapatra, however, claimed there was doubt about the winning possibility of the party candidate.
While Mr Mohapatra himself is the first candidate, former MLA Sashi Bhusan Behera has been fielded as the second candidate. Party spokesperson Baishab Parida, who is the third candidate in the race, is finding it hard to lock horns with the Independent candidate.