Bhubaneswar: Amid a serious internal rift in BJD over Waqf Bill voting, party president Naveen Patnaik on Wednesday came out in support of V K Pandian and strongly denied his role in any party affairs.
“I want to state quite clearly that Shri Karthikeyan Pandian in the past has done a lot of good work not only for the state but for the party. He should not be criticised or blamed for anything,” the former Chief Minister told reporters.
Naveen further stated that Pandian left the party over 10 months ago and is not involved in any of the party’s work.
The BJD supremo’s statement comes at a time when several party leaders are mounting a scathing attack on former bureaucrat Pandian over the Waqf Bill voting issue.
The BJD chief also came down heavily on party leaders holding meetings in places like hotels. “I would like to state here that I disapprove of any large meetings in hotels held by party members. They have the party office Sankha Bhawan which is a large building where they’ve been told they should hold their meetings and they should do so,” said Naveen.
The BJD supremo also lashed out at senior leader Pravat Tripathy, saying he does not belong to the party. “Prabhat Tripathy, ex-MLA was expelled from the BJD some years ago as he was indicted in chit fund case and he also spent some years in jail. I want to clarify again that he doesn’t belong to the party,” he said.
Political observers, however, pointed out that Pravat Tripathy, who had been suspended from BJD following his arrest by the CBI in a chit fund scam case, was subsequently brought back to the party fold. They cited a press release issued by BJD on November 10, 2017, stating that party president Naveen Patnaik had revoked the suspension of Pravat Tripathy, who was Banki MLA at that time.
