Bolangir Lok Sabha seat comprising seven Assembly segments such as Birmaharajpur, Sonepur, Losisingha, Patnagarh, Bolangir, Titilagarh and Kantabanji is most likely to witness a tough fight between the BJP, the Congress and the BJD.
Previous poll battles used to be confined to two members of the Bolangir royal family. However, the fight is most likely to be a different one since the BJD has not given chance to any scion of the royal family this time.
It has rather fielded a tribal leader this time. The polling for this seat will be held on May 20.
This time, the BJP has repeated its veteran leader and incumbent three-time MP Sangeeta Kumari Singh Deo, the wife of BJP stalwart and former Patnanagarh MLA KV Singh Deo, in this seat while the BJD has not repeated its previous candidate Kalikesh Narayan Singh Deo even though he won the seat in 2009 and 2014. It has fielded a tribal leader Surendra Singh Bhoi, who crossed over from Congress, against the BJP’s three-time MP.
However, BJD nominee Bhoi is confident of his win on the basis of the development agenda of the Naveen Patnaik government.
On the other hand, Congress has this time banked on a new face like Manoj Mishra, an Ollywood actor known for his share of controversies.
In 2019, Congress had fielded Samarendra Misha, son of veteran Congress leader and Loisihgna MLA Narasingh Mishra, as its MP nominee who had polled 2,71,056 votes.
In 2009, Congress leader Narashingha Mishra had given a tough fight to the BJD candidate KK Narayan Singh Deo by polling 3,39,315 votes.
In 1999, during the reign of Atal Vajpayee, the BJP opened its account in this seat, and Sangeeta Kumari Singhdev of the Bolangir royal family became the MP. She won the seat in 1999, 2004 and 2019.
In 2019, BJD fielded Kalikesh Narayan Singh Deo, who had been a two-time MP from this seat.
Sangeeta Kumari of the same royal family contested against him on a BJP ticket. In the 2019 election, BJPs Sangeeta Kumari won from this seat with 4,98,086 votes and BJDs Kalikesh Narayan Singh Deo polled 4,78,570 votes.
In the 2014 polls, BJDs Kalikesh Narayan Singh Deo won the seat with 4,53,519 votes, BJP’s Sangeeta Kumari Singh Deo received 3,49,220 votes while Congress candidate Sarat Patnaik polled 2,77,616 votes and the AAP candidate received 24,515 votes.
In 2009, the seat went the BJD kitty with Kalikesh Narayan Singh Deo winning the seat by polling 4,30,150 vote. Congress Narasingha Mishra had polled 3,39,315 votes while BJP’s Sangeeta Kumar Singhdeo polled 1,91,599 votes.
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Notably, the first election in the Bolangir Lok Sabha seat took place in 1962. At that time, Hrishikesh Mahanand of Swatantra Party had won the election.