Bhubaneswar: Several former MPs and MLAs, including former chief minister of Odisha Giridhar Gaman, boarded a chartered flight for Hyderabad from Biju Patnaik International Airport here on Friday.
Besides Gamang, his wife Hemabati Gamang and his son Shishri Gamang, former Congress MLA of Dhenkanal Nabin Nanda, former BJD MP Ramachandra Hansdah, Naba Nirman Krushak Sangathan (NNKS) leaders Akshay Kumar and Seshadev Nanda and RTI activist Pradip Pradhan were in the flight to Hyderabad.
The chartered flight is ferrying 18 leaders from the state and they will be joining K Chandrashekar Rao-led (KCR) Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS), which is looking at expanding its base in Odisha.
Kailash Mukhi, who recently quit Congress and joined BRS, was also seen wearing a blue half-coat.
According to sources, around 300 people from Odisha have left for Hyderabad to join BRS. Some people left in four luxury buses and trains on Thursday while 10 others left on Bhubaneswar-Hyderabad daily flight this morning.
The Gamangs are hoping to start fresh innings in Odisha politics with BRS. They resigned from the primary membership of the BJP on Wednesday. The duo had joined the saffron party in 2015 after quitting Congress. The senior Gamang may lead the party as Odisha unit president into the 2024 elections.
Shishir had earlier told Odisha Bytes that BRS will fight all 147 Assembly and 21 Lok Sabha seats in the state in the next elections.
South Odisha, spreading from Ganjam to Malkangiri, has a sizable number of Telugu voters, and the BRS seems to be trying to cash in on them. Gamang, the nine-time Lok Sabha MP, has a base in almost all constituencies under the Koraput parliamentary segment.
The party hopes to bag at least five Lok Sabha seats including Koraput, Nabarangur, Aska, Berhampur and Kandhamal, and 35 assembly segments coming under these constituencies.
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