Bhubaneswar: Even as BJP claimed that its MLA candidate for Khurda Prashant Jagdev was not involved in an EVM breaking incident, BJD accused the saffron party of protecting the goons for its vested interests.
“After the arrest of Jagdev, a competition seems to have broken out among the Odisha BJP leaders like Aparajita Sarangi to defend him in media as if he is innocent. As if his rise to greatness is due to breaking EVM, assaulting the presiding officer and polling staff and voters standing in queue there,” said BJD MP and national spokesman Sasmit Patra at a presser here on Tuesday.
Patra’s statement came after BJP’s Bhubaneswar MP Sarangi released a video of the polling booth, where Jagdev had allegedly damaged the EVM and attacked the polling officials, to prove his innocence.
Earlier, Chilika MLA Jadgev was arrested for his alleged involvement in the incident inside the polling station in Bolagarh block under Begunia Assembly constituency during the third round of voting in the state on May 25.
After the video went viral in social media, Chief Electoral Officer, Odisha, Nikunja Bihari Dhal on Tuesday directed District Election Officer (DEO), Khurda, to conduct an inquiry into the video.
Patra further said Jagdev was the same person who in a drunken state had driven his car over BJP party workers in 2022. He had also beaten up BJP Town president of Balugaon.
“Due to his criminal activities, chief minister and BJD president Naveen Patnaik had expelled him from the party. But the Odisha BJP leaders garlanded him, welcomed him and then gave him ticket as MLA candidate for Khurda Assembly seat in this election. It was BJP’s way of rewarding Jagdev for his criminal activities,” the BJD MP said.
He also lambasted BJP for giving ticket to people like Pradeep Panigrahy who cheated innocent youth in cash-for-jobs scam and Baijayant Panda whose company had was involved in illegal land-grabbing from Scheduled Caste people.
Patra further said the Central leaders of BJP, who are coming to Odisha during the election season and reading out the scripts given to them by their Odisha leaders, are probably unaware about the policy of state leadership in giving tickets to the criminals.
“The more they protect and defend such criminals, the lower they are falling in the eyes of the people and this is why Odisha BJP has been losing elections after elections,” Patra concluded.
Also Read: Odisha CEO Asks District Election Officer To Probe Viral ‘Begunia Polling Booth’ Video
