Nayagarh Politics: Irani Ray, Lala Manoj Quit BJP

Bhubaneswar: Irani Ray, who unsuccessfully contested the Nayagarh assembly elections in 2019, along with her husband Lala Manoj Ray quit the BJP on Friday.

Irani said the saffron party was neglecting her for the past several months, forcing her to resign. Before joining the BJP, Manoj was in the Congress and fought the Nayagarh assembly polls in 2014. On both occasions, BJD’s Arun Kumar Sahoo had emerged victorious. While in 2014, Arun defeated Manoj by a margin of about 21,000 votes, he beat Irani by over 14,000 votes five years later.

The BJP had earlier removed Manoj from the post of party Nayagarh district unit president. “Where is no respect, what is the point of continuing in such a party,” Manoj told a private news channel.

Irani reportedly was at loggerheads with Pratyusha Rajeshwari Kumari, who is vying for the BJP ticket for Nayagarh assembly segment. Pratyusha, a former MP from Kandhamal, joined BJD in 2014 following the death of her husband and former MP Hemendra Chandra Singh. In 2019, she left the regional party and joined the BJP. However, she did not get any ticket. BJP sources said she is a front-runner to get the BJP ticket for Nayagarh this time. This apparently had upset Irani, who too was in the race, party sources said.

Irani and Manoj’s future political plans are yet to be ascertained as they have not yet made those clear.