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Congress gambles big in Orissa RS polls

The Rajya Sabha election in Orissa is slated to be a show of strength for the Congress, while for the Bharatiya Janata Party-Biju Janata Dal alliance, it is a litmus test of its ability to take on the ruling party in the arena of state politics.

The poll, slated for Thursday, will also pose a question mark on the survival of the Janata Dal, and determine that party's equation with other political groups in the state.

The high visibility of the RS elections in Orissa, this time round, owes to the strength of the major political parties in the 147-member state assembly.

For the three RS posts in the state, four candidates are in the fray including three from the ruling Congress, one from the Biju Janata Dal backed and supported by its political ally, the BJP.

The ruling Congress has 83 MLAs, the BJD 27, the Janata Dal 14, the BJP 10, Independents 8, the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha 4 and the Jharkhand Peoples Party 1.

The presence of three Congress candidates has upset all calculations, leading to speculation of horse trading and cross voting in the election. The Congress had originally decided to field two candidates. Accordingly, former supreme court Chief Justice and former National Human Rights Commission chairman Ranganath Mishra and Indian National Trade Union Congress vice president Ram Chandra Khuntia filed their nominations.

It was the last minute decision, by the Congress, to field eminent historian and former vice-chancellor of Utkal University Manmath Nath Das as its third candidate that has taken the state polity by surprise -- not to mention the candidate himself, who was asked to rush to the state assembly at the last minute to file his nomination.

According to political analysts, the last minute decision by the Congress owes to dissension in the BJP over A U Singhdeo's nomination as its candidate. Singdeo's name was cleared at the last minute, to much opposition from a section of the BJD MLAs, who wanted the party to nominate a senior leader acceptable to other Opposition parties and also the Independents.

The JD with 14 members is yet to take a stand on whether to abstain from voting, or to allow conscience voting. The Congress for its part hopes to cash in on the rivalry between the JD and the BJD.

Elections to the RS seats were necessitated following the retirement of BJD members Ila Panda and Narendra Pradhan, and JD member S R Bommai.

Both Panda and Pradhan defected from the JD, joining the BJD a few months before their retirement along with three other JD RS members from Orissa.

Before this, the JD was the major Opposition party in the state and, at one point, all ten RS MPs from Orissa belonged to it. Thanks to the political attrition of the recent past, however, it now has Sanatan Bisi as its lone representative in the Upper House.

Against this background, the Congress seems hopeful of mustering the support of the JD, as also of the Independents and Jharkhand members, insupport of its third candidate.

The entire RS electoral exercise assumes added importance in light of intra-party bickeerings in the BJD, and bickerings within the BJD-BJP alliance, which was manifested in the recent byelections to the state assembly. The Congress, on that occasion, wrested three of the five assembly seats from the alliance.

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