Bhubaneswar: Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi, who has embarked on the 3,570-km campaign from Kanyakumari to Kashmir with scores of party workers, will be visiting Odisha at the end of this year with an eye on the 2023 elections, party sources said on Friday.
Speaking to the media, senior Congress leader Suresh Routray said that Rahul is scheduled to visit Odisha in December. “His visit was discussed during our last visit to Delhi. The programme will be held at Janta Maidan in Bhubaneswar,” he said.
The party office, however, has neither issued a confirmation on his visit nor his itinerary.
Rahul last visited Odisha in 2019.
While BJP has set the ball rolling for the 2024 elections with the appointment of Sunil Bansal as in charge of Odisha and a flurry of activities with top functionaries, including national president JP Nadda, visiting the state this month, BJD recently had a show of strength with party workers thronging the Bhubaneswar airport to receive party president and Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik on his return from Delhi after being conferred with Lifetime Achievement Award for outstanding leadership qualities.
The ruling party has also been affecting changes at the organisations’ level with recent appointments and six senior district observers.
Congress too is contemplating various programmes to strengthen its position in the state ahead of the elections. “Odisha is still poor and people are going to other states in search of jobs. The state was only developed during the period Congress was ruling the state. During the last election, Congress was in the second position. So I have confidence that in the 2024 election, Congress will come back to power,” state party president Sarat Patnayak recently told ANI.
Senior Congress leader Jaydev Jena has also claimed that the 2024 Assembly election could be “last chance” for the party to come to power in Odisha as the people are annoyed with both BJD and BJP. “If Congress forms government in 2024, it will remain in power for another 15 years. Therefore, all the party leaders should come together and fight the elections to defeat both the BJD and the BJP,” Jena said.
The grand old party has been out of power in the state since 2000 and relegated to the third position in the state since the 2019 Assembly elections. Since 2000, the Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC), plagued by intra-party feuds, has had 10 presidents. Several leaders, including working presidents Naba Kishore Das and Pradeep Majhi, quit Congress in recent years due to organisational weaknesses and infighting.
Congrees’ performance in panchayat elections, however, was noteworthy as it retained its traditional strongholds in southern Odisha and other areas, despite a poor show in Keonjhar and coastal districts. Several senior leaders maintained that if the party had more resources and effective election management machinery, the results would have been much better.
