Jajpur: The jump in the BJP’s vote share to 40.5 per cent from 15.53 per cent in the 2014 elections in the seven Assembly segments of Jajpur Lok Sabha seat has sounded alarm bells in the BJD.
Speculations are going on as to what would be the political situation in the district with the sharp rise in the vote share of the saffron party.
The BJP might have lost the seven Assembly seats and the Lok Sabha seat, but the sudden rise in its vote share in this election has certainly surprised political observers.
The ruling BJD had been winning the Jajpur Lok Sabha seat from the 2000 election and all Assembly seats from 2009.
The BJD continued its winning streak this time too by making a clean sweep of all the seven Assembly and the lone Parliamentary constituency. However, it has failed to garner public support like earlier. The BJD lost 5.91 per cent votes in the last five years.
The BJD received 55.78 per cent votes in the Jajpur Lok seat in the 2014 elections, but this time the party’s vote share has come down to 49.91 per cent. The biggest beneficiary of this is the BJP whose vote share jumped from 15.53 per cent in 2014 to 40.5 per cent in this election.
The worst loser is the Congress whose vote share has gone down to 8.39 per cent from 22.77 in 2014. This public support for BJP, if taken as a yardstick, can be considered a warning bell for the BJD.
The saffron party’s vote share started rising from the 2017 panchayat elections. The vote share of the party went up from the earlier 16 per cent to 31 per cent after the Zilla Parishad elections. The saffron party’s candidates contested the Zilla Parshad election on the party symbol.
The BJP became the second biggest party in the district even though its organisational network was not so strong.
The rise in the vote share of the BJP had shocked the ruling BJD as they feared that it might grow into a strong party by the 2019 elections. These fears have proved true as the saffron party’s vote share jumped to 40.5 per cent from 15.53 per cent in 2014.
The BJP has given a tough fight to winning BJD candidates in Barchana and Bari Assembly seats. The BJP candidate in Barchana was defeated by just 1,485 votes, while in Bari the party candidate lost by 4,062 votes.
Moreover, the polling percentage has gone down in Jajpur, Dharmasala, Korei and Binjharpur Assembly seats while it has increased a little in Sukinda, Bari and Barchana Assembly seats.
Observers said that the decline in polling percentage is not at all good for the BJD which has received the mandate to rule the state for a record 25 years.