After much deliberations, held across Bhubaneswar and Delhi, the BJD and BJP have decided not to form an alliance, with Odisha BJP president Manmohan Samal declaring Friday that the party would fight all the 21 Lok Sabha constituencies and 147 Assembly seats alone in the coming simultaneous polls.
In his statement, Samal thanked the Naveen Patnaik -led BJD for its support to the BJP government at the Centre at key moments, but said the BJP did not agree with the BJD government on many issues pertaining to “the interests of Odia people”, like “Odia asmita (pride)”, and “Odia glory”.
Though there was no official reaction from the BJD to Samal’s statement till Friday evening, party leaders said it was ready to fight alone. According to sources, BJD was reluctant to meet BJP’s ambitious plan to contest half of the seats in the state.
Eventually the talks fell through on the contentious issue of sharing of Assembly seats. The BJD reportedly did not want to contest on anything less than 100 of the 147 Assembly seats, in the only state where it has a presence. But the BJP insisted on around 57 seats.
Sources said the parties could not agree on a power-sharing formula post-elections either. The BJP’s plans to field certain rebel BJD leaders in the elections did not go down well with the BJD either. Samal was in Delhi till days ago, holding meetings with central leaders.
Announcing that there would be no alliance via a post on X, he wrote that the BJP would fight under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi “to fulfill the hopes and aspirations of 4.5 crore people of the state”. Samal said that all the states with “double-engine governments” had seen a spurt in growth and welfare, but that in Odisha, “many welfare programmes of the Modi government could not reach the grassroots. Many people are deprived”.
