As many as 36 ministers were either removed by Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik or resigned during the last 13 years of his rule, while only four were able to make a comeback.
Ministers considered powerful and close to him were asked to quit by him whenever there were embarrassing situations for the government to handle. The latest is the case of Raghunath Mohanty who always got very key portfolios in the last seven years. Only last year, Mohanty was the steel and mines, industries and parliamentary affairs minister.
The chief minister dropped his long-serving finance minister Prafulla Chandra Ghadei along with four other ministers on August 2 last, ahead of the last reshuffle, for alleged links with rebel leader Pyarimohan Mohapatra who wanted to overthrow him when he was on a foreign tour. Ghadei and the four others are yet to be rehabilitated in the party properly after they lost the leader’s trust.
One of the ministers, AU Singhdeo, had to quit taking moral responsibility for the hooch tragedy last year in Khurda and Cuttack districts which claimed 33 lives. Former agriculture minister Pradip Maharathi had to quit on January 19, 2012, for allegedly giving shelter to rape accused.
Several ministers had to quit following scams. Women and child development minister Pramila Mallik resign ed on February 5, 2011, following allegations of large-scale irregularities in the purchase of dal for the mid-day meal scheme. Altogether seven ministers, including Ramakrushna Patnaik were shown the door by the chief minister between 2000 and 2004. The former minister, considered a heavyweight in the BJD, resigned when his portfolio was changed from finance to agriculture. The six, who were dropped from the ministry, included Kamala Das, Prashant Nanda, Nalini Kanta Mohanty, Amar Prasad Satpathy, Debi Prasad Mishra and AP Singh.
The second term of BJD-BJP coalition government saw the exit of 14 ministers. While Rabinarayan Nanda had to quit for his alleged links with liquor mafia from Madhya Pradesh, the then excise minister Kalindi Charan Behera had to resign for the Ganjam hooch tragedy. In a surprise move, the chief minister dropped four ministers in May 2006—Damodar Rout (panchayati raj), Bijayshree Routray (health and family welfare), Nagendra Pradhan (minister of state for school and mass education) and Balabhadra Majhi (scheduled tribes and scheduled castes development).
Though Bishnu Das was among the six new faces inducted into the Cabinet, he had to resign two years later when the alleged tampering of marksheet of his son came to light. Steel and mines minister Padmanabha Behera had to quit following the Kandhmal riots.
Once a chief minister’s confidant, Debasis Nayak and the then Speaker Mohanty had to quit following a controversy over the allegations of a former marshal of the Assembly.
During the chief minister’s third term, 15 ministers have been removed so far, including Mohanty.
The Sunday Standard
