Bhubaneswar: Barely a month after election of senior BJD leader A U Singhdeo to Rajya Sabha, party supremo and Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik on Thursday announced his candidature from Bolangir assembly seat replacing party's earlier nominee in the face of protest by party workers.
"Singhdeo will contest from Bolangir assembly seat. He is resigning from Rajya Sabha," Patnaik told reporters here, two days after he announced the name of Harekrushna Sarangi as the party nominee for Bolangir seat.
Soon after Sarangi was fielded from the seat, a group of party workers and supporters led by Jyoti Panigrahy, former chairperson of state commission for women, staged a protest infront of Navee Niwas, the chief minister's residence, demanding change of the party candidate.
Singhdeo, a former minister and six-time MLA, happens to be a close friend of the chief minister. Singhdeo, who represented Bolangir five times and Loisingha once in the state assembly, had resigned from Naveen ministry on moral ground in 2011 following a hooch tragedy in Cuttack district as he was then holding the Excise portfolio.
Change of BJD candidate in Bolangir was effected keeping in mind Congress nominating senior leader and former minister Narsingha Mishra from the constituency.
Similar revolt by party workers and supporters in Kabisurya Nagar assembly segment in Ganjam district had forced Patnaik to withdraw the name of Latika Pradhan as BJD candidate from the constituency.
The BJD supremo, who had dropped nine-time MLA from the prestigious constituency V Sugnana Kumari Deo, had to re-nominate her for the seat in view of demand by party workers from the area.