MALKANGIRI: The Nabarangpur Lok Sabha constituency will witness a direct fight between BJD’s Ramesh Majhi, Congress’ Pradeep Majhi and BJP’s Balabhadra Majhi. The constituency goes to poll in the first phase on April 11. In 2014 General Elections, of the seven Assembly seats - Umerkote, Dabugam, Chitrakonda, Jharigan, Kotpad,
Nabarangpur and Malkangiri - Chitrakonda had given the then BJD Lok Sabha candidate Balabhadra the highest lead of 26,618 votes against his nearest Congress rival Pradeep, helping the ruling party bag the seat.
While Balabhadra had polled 50,302 votes against 23,684 votes by Pradeep, the BJP candidate Parsuram Majhi had managed only 19,302 votes from Chitrakonda Assembly segment in 2014. Balabhadra had even polled 2,302 more votes than the then BJD Assembly candidate Dambru Sisa who was elected from Chitrakonda Assembly segment by polling 48,000 votes.
In Malkangiri Assembly segment Parsuram had got the highest of 45,876 votes against 40,514 votes of Congress candidate. BJD’s candidate Balabhdra had then managed to poll only 39,370 votes. Balabhadra had won the Nabarangpur constituency in 2014 by a margin of only 2,042 votes in an eight cornered contest only because the Chitrakonda Assembly segment gave the party the highest lead.
However, in the changed political scenario where the Nabarangpur MP is seeking re-election from the same constituency on BJP ticket this time against BJD’s Ramesh, it remains to be seen who among the two Majhis can maintain the 2014 lead from the Chitrakonda segment.
Political observers feel it might be a tough task for the BJD to win the constituency again and Balabhadra can sway voters in favour of BJP this time. This apart, popularity of BJP has gone up after the Balakot strike, they added.
The saffron party has also successfully consolidated its vote bank in Malkangiri. Besides, widespread discontentment among the Bengali voters over denial of ticket to the incumbent MLA Manas Madkami has made the voters shift their loyalty in favour of BJP which is likely to help Balabhadra in winning the seat.
Change in mood of the voters post Prime Minister’s public meeting on Friday has put the BJP Lok Sabha and Assembly candidates in a comfortable position over its rivals, the observers added.