BHUBANESWAR: After an agonising wait, Utkal Bharat president and former MP Kharbela Swain returned to BJP on Monday with his formal induction into the saffron party and nomination from communally sensitive Kandhamal Parliamentary seat.
“Inspired by strong and dynamic leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi who successfully projected India as a world power and his fight against corruption from the top, I offered my service to BJP,” Swain said after joining BJP at a simple function here.
Appreciating the belated fight of BJP to dethrone an inefficient and corrupt BJD Government, Swain, a bitter critic of Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, said he joined the saffron party to end the 19 years of misrule of the regional outfit.
A three-time BJP MP from Balasore from 1998, Swain severed ties with BJP in December, 2009 following difference with the party’s State leadership. He floated a new political outfit Utkal Bharat in February, 2010 to take on the ruling BJD and opposition Congress.
Dubbing Swain’s return to BJP as ‘home coming’, Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said party workers never considered the former as leader of another party.
BJD and Congress have fielded Achyuta Samant and Manoj Kumar Acharya for Kandhamal Lok Sabha seat respectively.
On the day, the BJP named former Odisha DGP Prakash Mishra for Cuttack Lok Sabha constituency and candidates for 10 Assembly seats. Mishra, who was also the DG of CRPF, joined BJP on Sunday.
In a surprise move, the central election committee of BJP cleared the name of the party’s State vice president Pitambar Acharya for Hinjili Assembly seat which is represented by Naveen from 2000 onwards. The BJP also named Rishabh Nanda, son of BJD’s Rajya Sabha Member Prashant Nanda, as its candidate from Begunia Assembly segment.
Other BJP candidates include Dinesh Jain from Jharsuguda, Debendra Mahapatro from Rairakhol, Badrinarayan Dhal from Bhandaripokhari, Pradip Nayak from Bhadrak, Debanarayan Pradhan from Phulbani, Samapad Swain from Paradip and Biswaranjan Jena from Jatni.The BJP has, so far, declared candidates for 17 Lok Sabha and 131 Assembly seats.