Bhubaneswar: The Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) has decided not to support either the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) or the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the upcoming Rajya Sabha (RS) elections in state.
OPCC President Niranjan Patnaik, Sunday, said that his party has decided not to support the candidates of both BJD and BJP in the RS polls. According to Patnaik, the Congress MLAs do not need to vote in the RS polls as the party does not have a candidate for election to the Upper House.
Patnaik’s statement came at a time when the ruling BJD and the Opposition BJP did not have the numbers to clinch a victory for the fourth RS seat. The BJD has the number to win three out of the four vacant RS seats in Odisha. However, it lacks the magic number to win the fourth seat.
Similarly, the BJP does not have adequate MLAs to capture a RS seat in state.
Earlier, the CPM, with its lone MLA in Odisha, had announced that it would not participate in the RS polls.
Notably, the Congress party had won one RS seat from Odisha six years ago. Now, the party did not have the required numbers to field a candidate for the RS polls in state.