BHUBANESWAR: Muktikant Biswal, who hogged the limelight for his Delhi Chalo mission, has been named by the Congress as its candidate from the Rourkela assembly constituency for the upcoming polls.
Biswal hogged the limelight when he embarked on a journey on foot from Rourkela to New Delhi in April last year to remind Prime Minister Narendra Modi of the promises he had made during his maiden visit to the steel city.
The second list of Congress candidates for two Lok Sabha and 54 assembly seats was released by the party late on Friday. The Lok Sabha candidates include Samarendra Mishra, son of leader of the Opposition Narasingh Mishra, from Balangir and Saptagiri Ulaka from Koraput seat. However, announcement of Ulaka as Congress candidate has sparked off strong resentment in the party with Congress chief whip Tara Prasad Bahinipati alleging that there has been conspiracy in selection of candidates.
Sources said that the Bahinipati faction which is opposed to the group led by working president Pradip Majhi wanted Prafulla Bhadra as Congress candidate from the Koraput Lok Sabha seat. “Now the result will speak,” Bahinipati said, questioning the selection of party candidates in Koraput and Nabarangpur districts.
Selection of Manoj Manjari Debi for the Niligiri seat has also sparked off strong resentment among the party workers. The Congress list includes two former presidents of the Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) Prasad Harichandan and Jaydev Jena who will contest from Satyabadi and Anandpur constituencies respectively. Besides, OPCC working president and a sitting MLA Chiranjib Biswal has been announced as party’s candidate from the Jagatsinghpur seat.
Six other sitting MLAs, K Surya Rao, Prafulla Majhi, Anshuman Mohanty, Kailash Kulesika, Chandrasekhar Majhi and Devendra Sharma have been renominated from Parlakhemundi, Talsara, Rajnagar, Laxmipur, Kotpad and Aul seats respectively.
The list also has names of former ministers Ganeswar Behera (Kendrapara), Suresh Kumar Routray (Jatni) and Surendra Singh Bhoi (Titlagarh), former MLAs Santosh Singh Saluja (Kantabanji) and Uma Ballav Rath (Athgarh). Besides, the party has announced Subhashree Panda, wife of Maoist Sabyasachi Panda as its candidate from the Ranpur assembly seat.