Bhubaneswar: As many as 125 out of 174 candidates have lost their security deposits in the recently concluded Lok Sabha elections in the state. It means 71. 84 per cent (nearly 72 per cent) MP candidates have failed to secure one-sixth vote share in their respective seats.
According to the guidelines of Election Commission of India, a candidate will lose security deposit of Rs 25,000 (general) and Rs 12,500 (for schedule tribe and scheduled caste candidates) if they failed to get one-sixth (16.67 per cent) of the total valid votes polled.
Not a single Biju Janata Dal (BJD) or Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate has lost their deposits. As many 14 Congress or Congress supporting nominees have not been able to get back their deposits.
Out of the 21 LS seats, BJD got 12, BJP got 8 and Congress was able to win Koraput seat. The Congress and its supporting party candidates contesting from Aska, Balasore, Bargarh, Berhampur, Bhubaneswar, Cuttack, Dhenkanal, Jajpur, Kandhamal, Kendrapara, Keonjhar, Mayurbhanj, Puri and Sambalpur MP segments have lost their deposits.
Interestingly, Veteran Congress leader and former Union Minister Raja Kamakhya Prasad Singh Deo have also lost his deposit in this election. Deo was contesting from Dhenkanal LS seat, where he was elected to the LS six times (1967, 1980, 1984, 1991, 1996 & 1999).
BJD candidate Mahesh Sahoo won the Dhenkanal seat with 46.21 per cent vote share while BJP candidate Rudra Narayan Pany got 43.08 per cent votes.
Similarly, Navjyoti Patnaik, son of Niranjan Patnaik, who was the Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) president during election, has also lost his security deposit. He was contesting from Balasore LS seat.
In the Balasore seat, winning candidate from BJP, Pratap Chandra Sarangi, has got 41.79 per cent vote share while BJD’s Rabindra Kumar Jena was in second position with 40.67 per cent vote share. Navjyoti has got only 15.49 per cent votes.
Besides, Congress supporting candidates Rama Krushna Panda (CPI) and Janardan Pati (CPI-M) have also failed to get back their security deposits. While Panda got 5.92 per cent vote share in Aska LS seat, Pati succeeded to get only 2.29 per cent votes in the Bhubaneswar MP segment.