Odisha Assembly Elections 2024: Odisha Chief Minister and Biju Janata Dal Odisha (BJD) chief Naveen Patnaik on Thursday announced the fourth list of nine candidates for state assembly polls and one candidate for Lok Sabha Elections.
BJD fields Lekhasri Samantasinghar from Balasore Lok Sabha seat
BJD has nominated Lekhasri Samantasinghar as the party’s Balasore Lok Sabha candidate. Samantasinghar's recent switch from the BJP's Odisha unit marks a significant development, as she becomes the latest addition to the BJD's candidate roster for all 21 Lok Sabha seats. Notably, she is the second former BJP vice-president, following Bhrugu Baxipatra, to receive BJD's nomination for the Lok Sabha elections.
With Samantasinghar's nomination, the BJD has now fielded a total of seven women candidates for the Lok Sabha polls. This move aligns with the party's commitment to maintaining a 33 per cent reservation for women candidates, a principle it upheld during the 2019 general elections as well.
BJD names 9 candidates for Assembly polls
Among the nine assembly candidates announced by Chief Minister Patnaik, there have been significant changes, including the replacement of two sitting MLAs - Sambit Routray from Paradip and Bhupinder Singh from Narla.
Madhab Sardar, who previously contested and lost in the Keonjhar assembly seat in the 2019 elections, will now replace Premenada Nayak in Telkoi. Nayak, who had earlier resigned from the BJD and joined the BJP, received a nomination from the saffron party.
Notably, Prasanna Acharya, the party's senior vice-president, has been nominated as the candidate for the Sambalpur assembly seat. He will face off against the BJP's leader of opposition, Jaynarayan Mishra.
The sitting MLAs who have been renominated include Prabhu Jani from Laxmipur, Braja Pradhan from Talcher, Chakramani Kanhar from Baliguda, and Ananta Narayan Jena from Bhubaneswar Central.
Former minister and sitting MLA Rohit Pujari has been re-nominated from the Rairakhol seat. However, Paradip MLA Sambit Routray has been replaced by his wife, Gitanjali.
Additionally, Chief Minister Patnaik has decided not to nominate sitting MLA Bhupinder Singh from the Narla assembly segment in Kalahandi district. Instead, Manorama Mohanty has been chosen as the new face for the electoral race.
With these announcements, BJD has announced the names of 117 out of the 147 candidates for the assembly elections, along with all 21 nominees for the Lok Sabha elections.
Odisha Elections 2024
Simultaneous elections to 147 assembly seats and 21 Lok Sabha constituencies will be held in Odisha in four phases from May 13. As many as 28 Assembly seats will go for voting in the fourth phase on May 13, polling will be held in the next 35 constituencies on May 20. In the sixth phase, 42 constituencies would go for voting on May 25 and the same would be done for 42 more constituencies on June 1. The counting of votes at all constituencies will be done on June 4.
(With PTI inputs)
