Bhubaneswar: With a preponderant tribal population, Mayurbhanj zoomed into international focus when daughter of the soil Droupadi Murmu was elected the president of India in July 2022.
The first person from a tribal community – Murmu is Santhal – to hold this honour, she has a keen understanding of the politics of Mayurbhanj where she had a long career as a public representative which saw her being elected to Odisha assembly from the Rairangpur seat twice and also become a minister in the Biju Janata Dal-Bharatiya Janata Party coalition government led by Naveen Patnaik.
Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty
As the battle for Mayurbhanj Lok Sabha seat intensifies, Murmu is once again in focus with both BJP and BJD vying with each other to take credit for her election to the top office of the country.
While Prime Minister Narendra Modi at his election rallies has been reminding people that Murmu was the choice of his party which holds tribal people and women in high regard chief minister Naveen Patnaik, the star campaigner of BJD, has described the president as his sister. Addressing public meetings at Baripada and Rairangpur in Mayurbhanj, where tribal people account for nearly 58% of the population, the chief minister recently said that his party had extended support to Murmu in the Presidential polls as she is the daughter of the soil.
By all accounts Murmu is going to be a big factor in deciding the fate of Mayurbhanj Lok Sabha constituency where BJD, BJP and Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) are locked in a keen triangular contest.
This is the only Lok Sabha seat in the state where JMM has a stake and the party – having put up Anjani Soren, sister of former Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren and daughter of its founder Shibu Soren as its candidate – is taking the battle seriously.
However, the main fight would still be between BJD candidate, state’s revenue and disaster management minister Sudam Marandi and BJP’s Naba Charan Majhi whom the party has fielded this time by replacing Union minister Biseshwar Tudu who won the seat in 2019. Incidentally Majhi is the sitting MLA from Rairangpur assembly seat which Droupadi Murmu represented twice in the past. She also hails from the area which was the main theatre of her activities when she was in active politics.
While it is being speculated that Tudu was replaced by the BJP this time as he had courted a few controversies during his visits to the state as a Union minister, the choice of Majhi seems to have been dictated by his clean image and the fact that he was representing the same region in the state assembly as the president.
The BJD has fielded Sudam Marandi as he also enjoys influence among a section of JMM supporters who are slowly beginning to realise the futility of voting for the party which is on the wane in the state. The party won the seat only once in 2004 when Marandi, then the face of the JMM in the state, was its candidate. The decline of the tribal outfit in Odisha has been quick ever since his defection to the ruling BJD. The regional party hopes that it would be able to wrest the seat from the BJP with Marandi winning over a sizeable chunk of JMM voters.
Droupadi Murmu with Bishweshwar Tudu at a government function in Odisha. Photo: PIB
With the party pinning its hopes on Marandi, CM Patnaik has stepped up his campaign, centring it around development and tribal pride. While the BJD is projecting its support for Murmu in the presidential polls as proof of its respect for tribal people and women it is also highlighting development in Mayurbhanj which is visible in the shape of improved road communication and the establishment of a medical college and hospital named after tribal scholar, Raghunath Murmu. The party claims that its government has also sanctioned Rs 13 crore for the development of Raghunath Murmu’s birthplace.
With JMM, which won the seat only once in 2004, progressively marginalised in the politics of the district, the focus is now on BJP and BJD which have been rivals since their alliance broke ahead of 2009 elections. Before the rupture of the alliance the seat was with the BJP in 1998 and 1999. However, following the collapse of their partnership the BJD won the seat twice in 2009 and 2014.
The 2019 elections saw BJP’s dominance in the constituency. Besides winning the Lok Sabha seat, party candidates also won from five of seven Assembly segments under the parliamentary constituency. However, BJD sought to make course corrections and even strengthened its organisation in the district. The man responsible for this was none other than chief minister’s trusted lieutenant and BJD organisational secretary Pranab Prakash Das who was made the observer for Mayurbhanj. In the panchayat elections held in 2022 BJD won a majority of zila parishad seats in the district, thus recovering a lot of ground that it had lost to the saffron party in 2019. “The results of panchayat polls show that we are now the dominant party in Mayurbhanj. We hope things will turn in our favour this time,” said BJD supporter Sukanta Das.
The rivalry between BJP and BJD has intensified as evident from the high voltage campaign of the two parties which have been hurling accusations at each other. Keen on breaking BJP’s hold on the seat, chief minister Naveen Patnaik is leading his party’s charge against its main rival from the front. He is leaving no stones unturned to ensure an outright victory for his party which has become crucial to its survival as it is becoming increasingly evident that this election in Odisha could very well go down to the wire.
