Bhubaneswar: The eight MLAs, who were suspended on grounds of anti-party activities and violation of the party whip during the recent Rajya Sabha elections in Odisha, should resign and seek fresh mandate, BJD whip Pramila Mallik said on Monday.
The senior BJD leader threw this challenge at the rebel legislators after a delegation of BJD MLAs met Odisha Assembly Speaker Surama Padhy and submitted a formal petition demanding their disqualification. “The legislators should either resign from their Assembly seats or face removal. If they truly believe they enjoy public support, they should contest the by-elections,” she told reporters
Echoing the same, BJD MLA Arun Sahoo said the Speaker was apprised that the eight MLAs not only ignored the party whip but also distanced themselves from the party. “They have publicly denounced the BJD and gone against its directive, which means that they have voluntarily given up membership of the party,” he said.
The BJD has invoked the anti-defection law under the Tenth Schedule, which disqualifies a member for voluntarily giving up party membership or voting/abstaining contrary to a party direction (whip) without prior permission, he noted.
Sahoo cited precedents such as the 2017 disqualification of JD(U) leader Sharad Yadav from the Rajya Sabha, where public opposition to party leadership and alignment with rivals was deemed as voluntarily giving up membership. Similar actions against MLAs in Himachal Pradesh were also referenced.
He argued that openly defying the party whip and leadership amounts to defection under the anti-defection law.
The controversy stems from the Rajya Sabha biennial elections held in March 2026. The BJD, in alliance with Congress and Left parties, had backed independent candidate Datteswar Hota. However, eight BJD MLAs reportedly cross-voted in favour of BJP-backed independent candidate Dilip Ray, who ultimately won the seat. Two days prior to the polling, the BJD had issued a clear whip directing its MLAs to remain at the party headquarters and attend an official meeting, directions some of the accused legislators allegedly ignored.
The party first issued show-cause notices and later suspended six of the MLAs – Chakramani Kanhar (Baliguda), Naba Kishore Mallick (Jayadev), Souvic Biswal (Choudwar-Cuttack), Subasini Jena (Basta), Ramakanta Bhoi (Tirtol), and Devi Ranjan Tripathy (Banki) – for anti-party activities, including cross-voting that violated the BJD constitution’s emphasis on absolute loyalty to collective decisions. The suspensions, approved by the Political Affairs Committee chaired by party president Naveen Patnaik, reduced the BJD’s strength in the 147-member Odisha Assembly to 42 (from 51 seats won in the 2024 elections). The other two – Aravind Mohapatra (Patkura), Sanatan Mahakud (Champua) – were already under suspension.
This came a day after former Bhadrak MP Manjulata Mandal, her husband and former Dhamnagar MLA Muktikanta Mandal, whom BJD president Naveen Patnaik suspended on April 6 for alleged anti-party activities, along with several senior leaders and more than 500 workers from Bhadrak district, resigned from the party. Prominent among those who quit include former district president Jagannath Swain, BJD leader Shashi Sahu, and former Simulia MLA candidate Subasini Sahoo.
