BJP sets eyes on all Assembly and Parliamentary seats reserved for Scheduled Tribes in Odisha

While as many as 33 seats out of a total of 147 Assembly Constituencies of Odisha Legislative Assembly were reserved for Scheduled Tribes (ST) in the last 2024 General Elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) managed to win 18 of them. Meanwhile, after forming the government for the first time in Odisha, the saffron party is now trying to strengthen its organizational structure further in the State.

BJP is now mainly focusing on the reserved seats where it suffered losses. In a felicitation ceremony organised by the ST morcha of the party on Sunday, it was decided that the party will work in a mission mode to win all the ST reserved seats. Moreover, planning has also been made in this regard.

As per reports, Chief Minister Mohan Majhi assigned tasks to the party workers to win all 33 Assembly and five Parliamentary ST reserved seats. 

“BJP government’s main priority will be to fulfill the demands of ST morcha. When ST morcha will put forth any demand before the government, Mohan Majhi will be one of their members,” said CM Majhi.

Panchayati Raj Minister Rabi Naik also expressed concern about various problems of the ST community.

“It’s a matter of concern that the number of tribal people are dwindling. All the problems should be solved and schemes should be implemented by dividing the constituencies into clusters,” said Naik.

BJP has got more support from the tribals in 2024. While the party had won only 11 seats from the 33 reserved Assembly seats in 2029, the number increased to 18 in 2024. Similarly, the party won four reserved Parliamentary seats in 2024 in comparison to two seats in 2019.

Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan has urged the party workers to be in action mode to review the reason behind the party’s defeat in the reserved seats. Moreover, Union Minister Jual Oram has given suggestions that one leader should adopt one reserved seat each in which the party got defeated.

“Our MLAS and MPs should adopt the reserved seats in which we lost and our workers should support them,” said Oram.

BJP played a masterstroke by making tribal lady Droupadi Murmu from Mayurbhanj the President of India before the election. Moreover, the party has made Mohan Majhi the Chief Minister of Odisha and appointed Jual Oram as the Union Tribal Affairs Minister. From these circumstances, it is guessed that BJP’s tribal vote bank may be strengthened further.