Day after quitting Cong, Pranay Sahu joins ruling BJD

Bhubaneswar: A day after quitting Congress, senior leader from Bargarh district

Pranay Sahu

on Tuesday joined BJD in the presence of chief minister Naveen Patnaik at the latter’s residence here.

Expressing gratitude to the chief minister for accepting him in BJD, Sahu said he decided to join the ruling party to further the interests of his constituency of Bijepur. “Senior Congress leaders and former ministers are quitting the party; we are mere workers. How could we repose our faith in Congress?” he told the media here.

Asked about his reason to quit, Sahu said he had requested the state Congress leadership to examine the party’s defeat in the high-stakes Bijepur byelection, but that his requests were ignored. The bypoll was necessitated following the death of incumbent legislator, Congress’s Subal Sahu.

In spite of Bijepur being known as a Congress stronghold, (Pranay) Sahu got only 10,272 votes and even forfeited his deposit. Subal’s widow Rita Sahu, who contested on a BJD ticket, won the bypoll with an impressive margin of more than 40,000 votes. With Sahu joining BJD with only a few months left for the polls, there is speculation that he can be an aspirant for a party ticket from the Bijepur assembly segment.

Rita, who attended his induction at Naveen Niwas, said he had worked closely with her late husband and that he would strengthen BJD in Bijepur ahead of the general and assembly polls.