Naveen Patnaik swings both ways !!

Yes, article 377 is the hot topic of discussion now days. Biju Janata Dal (BJD) MPs in particular are extremely supportive for its decriminalization. Hold on to your imagination after reading this head line. Before you start considering this to be on the sexual preference of the Hon’ble CM of Odisha , this is not a commentary on his sexual orientation. Read on and you might understand.

After the sad demise of Biju Babu his youngest dependent Naveen Patnaik wore his shoes by contesting the Aska Lok Sabha by-election. Biju Babu was the incumbent MP from Aska during his demise, thus the by-election. Naveen won the  by poll on a Janata Dal Ticket and not only did he wear Biju Babu’s shoes as the MP of Aska, on 19 March 1998 he even wore Biju Babu’s old hat, that of the Union Cabinet Steel & Mines Minister of India.  Naveen Patnaik broke away from Janta Dal to form BJD & joined hands with the BJP. This alliance went on to win the year 2000 assembly elections to form the first ever BJD-BJP government in Odisha. That was the ‘India shining era’ of Vajpayee ji, the ambitious Naveen preponed the assembly elections of Odisha by a year to ride the wave of ‘India shining’ and decided to hold the assembly elections along with the general elections in year 2004. Unexpectedly the Congress led UPA won in the center, however the BJD-BJP alliance won in Odisha.

It was Dec 2006, on the behest of senior congress leaders , I was formally inducted into the Indian National Congress. Year 2007 & 2008 the congress was on an upswing in Odisha. In mid 2008 the then crisis manager of BJD, Pyari Mohan Mohapatra was first made to convey the swing of Naveen Patnaik towards Congress. Unexpectedly Ajay Makan the then AICC in charge of Odisha, instead of strengthening the party, started committing blunders which would turn out to be detrimental for Congress but would favor the BJD. Naveen via his friends in Congress high ups started giving feelers to the Congress high command that his party would part ways with BJP and possibly collide with the Congress for the year 2009 general elections. A back room deal was struck between BJD and the Congress. Barely few months prior to the general elections Jaydev Jena was dropped and KP Singh Deo was made the OPCC president. A few days later to that, Ajay Makan too was dropped and Ghulam Nabi Azad was made the AICC in charge for Odisha. Should the records be looked upon, Ajay Makan was AICC in-charge of Chhattisgarh & Odisha and later Ghulam Nabi Azad was made the AICC in-charge of Chhattisgarh, Odisha, AP, Karnataka & Tamil Nadu for the 2009 elections.

As per the pre-scripted plan, few days prior to the year 2009 elections the BJD snapped ties with the BJP and in an unannounced manner internally supported the Congress. To the same the later too complimented Naveen Patnaik. In 2009 Congress improved its tally to 6 from 2 MPs from Odisha and UPA-2 was formed. While BJD won the single majority to form Naveen’s first ever single party Government in Odisha.

Though externally the farce of a conflict was kept burning, from 2009 to 2014 the cross internal complimenting of the Congress and the BJD continued. Things changed after the BJP announced Narendra Modi as their PM candidate for year 2014 elections, the spin doctors of Naveen Patnaik were again put to play but this time Pyari was not in the picture. The much hyped 29 May Mid night coup was portrayed as the reason to keep Pyari out. This time Naveen’s one arm  played up with the Congress and his other arm played up with the BJP. Results of 2014 elections showed the fantastically politicked plot of Naveen Patniak & his cronies. BJD swept the 2014 General elections as well as the state assembly elections.

The Feb 6-7, 2016 visit of PM Narendra Modi to Odisha was conceived sometime around Oct 2015 coincidentally around the same time when the PM had announced that the Netaji Files would be declassified in Delhi on Jan 23, 2016. If one closely sees the photographs released of the PM being received by dignitaries at the Bhubaneswar Airport on 6 Feb '16 , the same can certainly be used by the likes of Haggard & Isaacs for their case studies. Also if the 7 Feb'16 tweets from the official twitter handle of the PMO (@PMOIndia) is closely watched, it shall clearly tell you that the PMO core has now been compromised by the cronies of the Odisha CM.

  

In year 2016 current date, the Congress is at an all time low in Odisha just as the BJP was in year 2009. Naveen Patnaik has again started swinging, and this time he is doing so with BJP just as he had done with the congress for the year 2009 elections. One can bluff once, but it is to be seen that Naveen Patnaik’s bluff has worked fabulously twice over. Will this both way swinging make it work the third time for BJD in 2019?

  More on the author Shri. Suparno Satpathy at  www.SuparnoSatpathy.in