BHUBANESWAR : The fulminations within the party over “conscience” voting on Waqf (Amendment) Bill, 2024, in the Rajya Sabha virtually reached the doorsteps of BJD president Naveen Patnaik on Monday with MP Munna (Muzibulla) Khan along with his supporters meeting the latter and demanding disciplinary action against leader of party in the Upper House Sasmit Patra for voting in favour of the contentious legislation.
Khan, who opposed the Bill during the debate in Rajya Sabha and voted against it, led his supporters and members of the Muslim community in a procession from the airport to Naveen Niwas to lodge his protest against the decision to leave the voting to the conscience of the party’s RS MPs.
Coming down heavily on Sasmit for openly supporting the Bill which went against the original decision of the BJD to oppose it, Khan demanded that the party chief should inquire into the matter which was very serious.
Seeking strong action against all those who voted for the Bill, Khan said, “If anyone wanted to join BJP, they were free to do so. But they cannot speak the language of another political party while being in the BJD.”
This would possibly be the first time that Naveen had to face such anger from his own partymen, that too, at his own residence. He assured the agitators that he will look into the matter which has erupted on the party’s last-minute change in stand on the Bill. Stating that necessary steps will be taken to resolve the issue, he said, “Whatever needs to be done will be done.”
Naveen asserted that BJD has been and continues to be a secular party. “We had even broken our alliance with the BJP for this ideology in 2009. Biju Babu always stood with the minority community and I am also with them,” he said.
However, the protesters trained their guns on Naveen’s trusted aide and former bureaucrat VK Pandian, holding him responsible for the fiasco. Even as Pandian has retired from active politics after 2024 elections, they alleged that he continued to pull the strings in the party and was behind this dubious decision.
Pandian comes under attack, 4 MPs support vote decision
Not satisfied with Naveen’s assurances, they raised ‘Pandian Go Back’ and ‘Pandian Hatao, BJD Bachao’ slogans at Naveen Niwas, seeking justice on the issue.
Meanwhile, four RS BJD MPs came out in support of the decision and attacked their party colleague Debasis Samantray for abstaining from voting and making statements in a bid to create division in the party. Samantray had on Saturday without naming Pandian stated that ‘the chief advisor’ to party president had made the last minute change in the party’s stand on the Bill and Patra had only carried out instructions.
Stating that the decision to go for conscience vote was taken by the party president, MP Subhasis Khuntia said Khan who represents Muslims voted against the Bill while Patra who is a Christian voted in favour of the Bill.
His colleague Manas Mangaraj said, “It’s very unfortunate to see that my Rajya Sabha colleague Debasish Samantaray has attacked VK Pandian over Waqf Bill decision despite the fact that the latter has already retired from politics 10 months ago and is not participating in any meeting or political activity.” Another RS member Sulata Deo said Samantraray was doing so only to hide his own defects.
Congress MLA from Cuttack-Barabati Sofia Firdous too jumped in to fish in troubled waters and targeted Samantaray, a former BJD MLA, from the seat. “Patra, at least, openly admitted that he voted in favour of the Bill, but Samantaray indirectly supported the BJP by abstaining from voting. He would have voted against the Bill, if he had any emotion for the people of the Assembly constituency which he represented earlier,” she said.