BHUBANESWAR: Even as the new Council of Ministers gets a younger look, it seems Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik has given a go by to the formula of regional distribution while finalising the Ministry. As many as 12 districts have gone unrepresented.
While the average age of the members of the Ministry is 52, Minister of State Padmini Dian is the youngest at 32 years. There are four ST, two SC and two women members in the new team. BJD candidates won from 22 SC seats of the total 25 while 25 nominees out of 34 ST seats came out successful.
However, the performance of the regional outfit in the Lok Sabha polls and the party’s vote share in the elections from the districts seems to have played a key role in the choice of Ministers for the new team. For the first time, some of the coastal Odisha districts including Kendrapara and Jajpur have been left out of the Ministry.
While BJD candidate from Kendrapara Lok Sabha seat Anubhav Mohanty defeated his BJP rival Baijayant Panda by a margin of over 1.51 lakh votes, the vote share of the regional outfit came down in the 2019 elections compared to the previous polls. Senior leaders Pratap Deb and Atanu Sabyasachi Nayak, who won Assembly polls from seats under the Kendrapara Lok Sabha constituency, were in the race for a berth in the new team. However, both of them have been ignored.
In Jajpur Lok Sabha seat too, the winning margin of the BJD candidate had come down drastically to 1,01,693 from 3,20,271. Both Kendrapara and Jajpur were strongholds of BJD where the BJP has made deep inroads in this election.
Similarly, Ganjam, Sambalpur and Sundargarh districts where the performance of BJD was not so impressive have got no representation. While the regional outfit won Berhampur and Aska Lok Sabha seats with reduced margin, it was defeated in Sambalpur and Sundargarh Parliamentary constituencies by BJP.
Khurda district also got only one Minister of State Ashok Panda. BJD candidate from Bhubaneswar Lok Sabha seat Arup Patnaik had polled less votes than his BJP rival Aparajita Sarangi in the Assembly segments of Bhubaneswar City though the MLA nominees of the regional outfit won from these seats. The three-time MLA from Ekamra seat was inducted to the Ministry but was not given the expected Cabinet rank.
Other districts which remain unrepresented are Nabarangpur, Gajapati, Malkangiri, Bhadrak, Angul, Boudh and Kandhmal. No BJD candidate has won from Deogarh district.
Left out of loop
● For the first time, some of the coastal Odisha districts including Kendrapara and Jajpur have been left out of the Ministry
● Ganjam, Sambalpur and Sundargarh districts have also got no representation