BALANGIR: In Balangir, the political fight in panchayat elections will be confined to members of the royal families of AU Singhdeo, his uncle KV Singhdeo and a seasoned leader Narasingh Mishra. It will be a triangular fight among the BJD, the BJP and the Congress.
Except the Congress that has its hands full with issues and ammo, the BJP will have a lot of explanation to do on the impact of demonetisation in the long run and the BJD will harp on the welfare schemes launched by the State Government, political observers say. However, as the situation stands today, the BJP will have an upper hand in each of the three Zilla Parishad seats in the blocks of Patnagarh, Belpada and two in Khaprakhol under Patnagarh sub-division, which is represented by five-time MLA from Patnagarh Assembly segment, KV Singhdeo.
Though the odds are against the BJD, yet the ruling party will go for the polls with the advantage of its candidate winning 26 out of the 34 Zilla Parishad seats representing 14 blocks in the district while the tally of the BJP was five and three in the case of the Congress in the last panchayat polls held in 2012.
The BJD campaign will be led by A U Singhdeo, besides his sons Kalikesh and Arakesh. With the tradition of people from Gadjat area having great respect for the King, the BJD seems to be well placed along with woman legislator from Titlagarh Tukuni Sahu, Kantabanji MLA Ayub Khan and Loisingha MLA Jogendra Sahu.
With his wife and former Balangir MP Sangeeta Singhdeo distancing from active politics, Patnagarh MLA KV Singhdeo will lead the campaign for the BJP along with Gopalji Panigrahi, who is leading the Suktel agitation.
The Congress campaign will be led by Narsingha Mishra with DCC president Bhagbana Bagarti resigning from the post a few days back.