Party fails to secure majority in ULBs coming under Assembly segments of Ministers

Despite the ruling Biju Janata Dal headed by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik performing well by securing majority in over 40 of 66 urban local bodies in the State where polls were held on Thursday, the outcome of the polls had sounded warning bells for the regional party.

The failure of the BJD in securing a majority in many urban local bodies that came under the Assembly segments of its Ministers and senior leaders had come as a clear indication that anti-incumbency factor had finally started working against the Naveen Patnaik Government.

The party won the polls in 40-odd ULBs despite the fact that it had 60-odd legislators in the regions where elections were held. Its prominent strongholds where the BJD lost include Angul, Nayagarh, Basudevpur, Athamallik, Pipili and Jagatsinghpur.

A BJD leader said though they had achieved good results in the polls they had to start working seriously to overcome the anti-incumbency factor and restore its popularity among the urban voters before the next year's Assembly elections.

The BJP, the BJD's one-time ally in the State, too suffered the most in the civic polls despite banking heavily on the party's Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi.

The BJP leaders highlighted the emergence of Mr. Modi as their Prime Ministerial candidate to woo the voters in all the urban local bodies where their party had fielded candidates.

The saffron party which had formed councils in 11 of the 66 urban local bodies in 2008, ended up in winning only 47 of the 1,147 wards under the 66 where elections were held. The BJP was a partner of the BJD in the State government in 2008.

The main opposition Congress had managed to do better than the 2008 urban polls in terms of percentage of votes and had also won majority in several BJD strongholds.

Congress, however, failed to take more benefit of the existing anti-incumbency factor against the BJD government primarily due to infighting within the party.

Meanwhile, many of the BJD candidates who won the polls in different ULBs came and met the Chief Minister at his residence and celebrated their victory.

Talking to presspersons, Mr. Patnaik thanked the people for voting in favour of the BJD nominees.
He also thanked the party leaders who worked hard to help the party emerge victorious.

On the other hand, the Congress started review of the factors that resulted in their not-so impressive performance and the BJP began discussions on the reasons that contributed towards its debacle in the polls.

  • Congress fails to benefit from
    infighting in the BJD
  • BJP begins discussions on its poll debacle