ROURKELA: The BJP’s Jual Oram was heading for a huge victory from Sundargarh Lok Sabha (LS) constituency with a lead of 1.95 lakh votes over his Congress rival till 9 pm on Thursday.
With counting of votes on, the Union Tribal Affairs Minister will increase the lead further to secure his fifth victory from the constituency.
Till last reports came in, Jual was in a comfortable position with over 3.5 lakh votes against his nearest rival of Congress and Birmitrapur MLA George Tirkey who got around 1.99 lakh votes. The ruling BJD’s Sunita Biswal, daughter of former Congress Chief Minister Hemanand Biswal, was in third position with 1.9 lakh votes. Six other candidates of smaller parties including Aam Admi Party and Independent may lose their security deposits.
Jual’s lead is a result of outstanding performances by the BJP’s candidates in at least five of the seven Assembly segments under the LS constituency. Speaking to this paper, Jual said BJP’s performance is the victory of Indian citizens and Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He said good work done by Modi-led Government has paid and his party would continue working with the agenda of ‘Sabka Saath Sabka Vikash’. He said in five of the seven Assembly seats, BJP candidates are doing well and are poised for victory.
Jual had first won from Sundargarh LS constituency in 1998 and repeated his win in 1999 with a lead of about 1.36 lakh and 1.52 lakh votes respectively.
But in 2004, his winning margin was reduced to about 40,000 and in 2009 he faced surprise loss to Congress nominee and former Congress Chief Minister Hemanand Biswal with above 11,000 votes. Jual bounced back in 2014 and defeated BJD nominee and hockey icon Dilip Tirkey with 18,900 votes, while Hemanand slipped to third spot. Incidentally, Jual was only LS Member of BJP from Odisha in 2014.
After his 1999 win, the then Prime Minister AB Vajpayee had carved out the Ministry of Tribal Affairs for Jual and he returned to the same ministry in 2014.