Balasore Looks Headed For Three-Cornered Tight Contest

When Balasore Lok Sabha constituency goes to the polls in the fourth and final phase on Monday, voters will try and recall if the district had ever witnessed campaigning like in this election.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi campaigned in this district, so did Odisha Chief Minister and BJD president Naveen Patnaik. Even Congress president Rahul Gandhi held a rally in the district — making it apparent that none was willing to concede ground.

With hundreds of small-time investors being duped, the chit fund is an emotive issue with the voters. Nonetheless, the ruling BJD has fielded sitting MP Rabindra Jena once again. Jena was questioned by the CBI in 2016 during its investigation into the chit fund scam.

The BJD hopes Jena will do an encore and crush his nearest rival Pratap Chandra Sarangi of the BJP. But Sarangi remains optimistic of trouncing Jena at the hustings. Jena had defeated him by over 1.43 lakh votes in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.

“People have seen the BJD government for 20 years and its gross apathy towards Balasore district. They are now inclined to vote for change, and it is evident. The revival of the East Coat canal has also turned into a big issue, but the BJD government did nothing about it,” he said in his campaign trails.

Balasore wore a pink look last week with banners and posters enveloping the city’s landscape.

Naveen had held a roadshow on his bus, traversing the city and the length and breadth of the district. Senior BJP leader Dharmendra Pradhan matched him with a similar road show.

In fact, senior leaders from both the parties have held extensive campaigning in the district, leading to an apparent conclusion — the battle for votes will go down to the wire.

The Congress party’s decision to field Nabajyoti Patnaik, son of state Congress chief Niranjan Patnaik, has made the electoral battle even more interesting. Nabajyoti hit the campaign trail on a bicycle to make a real connect with the voters. And he has managed to pull crowds. He is upbeat despite the presence of two heavyweight candidates in the battlefield. In villages, he is repeatedly pointing to the Congress poll promise of a farm-loan waiver and fixing Rs 2,600 as MSP for paddy procurement.

The Congress fielded him from the Balasore seat after former Balasore MP Srikant Jena’s exit from the party.

It remains to be seen whether Nabajyoti’s connect with the farmers will help him gain the popular mandate of the voters, or if voters will choose the BJP over the BJD in a three-way contest for the Balasore seat.