If Naveen wants, father can return to BJD: Damodar Rout's son Sambit

Bhubaneswar: Speculations are rife that senior BJP leader Damodar Rout may quit the saffron party and return to the ruling-BJD fold. Such speculations have been fuelled by the statements of Dama's son Sambit Routray who said that, “If BJD supremo and Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik wants, my father can return.”

Sambitfurther stated that in politics everything is possible and his father is not an isolated person. My father (Damodar Rout) was part of the Janata Parivar and BJD and people could not accept him as a saffron party leader after he left BJD and joined BJP in March 2019 before the general elections. It seems this was the reason that he lost the recent 2019 elections from Balikuda-Ersama assembly seat,” he added.

“Like everybody else, I also feel that my father is unhappy in BJP,” Routray added.

BJD MLA Sambit Routray today claimed that his father Damodar Rout is not happy after joining BJP; soon the senior saffron party leader responded in his own style #WATCH the statements of both Sambit and his father pic.twitter.com/AwYtSOzhs7

— OTV (@otvnews) June 7, 2019

Responding to the statements of his son, Damodar Rout said, “I am a BJP leader & my son is a BJD legislator, so how come he knew I was unhappy?”

Rout further stated that victory, defeat are part of poll process, but the party (BJP) which accepted me, has taken me in with respect. I have not told anyone that I am unhappy, he added.