In a blow to the Congress in Odisha ahead of the elections in Odisha, its Puri Lok Sabha candidate Sucharita Mohanty has dropped out of the contest citing the alleged denial of funding by the party.
Hours later, the party named its Puri district unit chief Jay Narayan Patnaik, an advocate, as Mohanty’s replacement. Though Patnaik has been associated with the Congress for the past few years, he will make his electoral debut in this election. The last date for filing nominations in Puri is May 6.
Mohanty’s decision came days after the party’s candidate in Madhya Pradesh’s Indore, Akshaya Kanti Bam, withdrew his nomination and joined the BJP and weeks after the nomination of its Surat candidate Nilesh Kumbhani was rejected, with the BJP winning the seat in Gujarat uncontested as all other candidates withdrew their nominations.
Mohanty, who stood second from Puri in the 2014 polls, sent a mail to Congress general secretary for organisation K C Venugopal on Friday night, saying that without the party’s financial help it will not be possible for her to campaign in Puri. The constituency, currently held by the Biju Janata Party’s (BJD) Pinaki Misra, votes in the sixth phase on May 25.
“Our campaign in the Puri parliamentary constituency has been hit hard because the party has denied me funding. AICC Odisha in-charge Dr Ajoy Kumar ji categorically asked me to fend for myself. I was a salaried professional journalist who entered electoral politics 10 years ago. I have given all I have into my campaign in Puri,” Mohanty wrote.
Facing a fund crunch, Mohanty, who is the daughter of freedom fighter and former Congress leader Braja Mohan Mohanty, launched a donation drive earlier this week. In her mail to Venugopal, she wrote, “I tried a public donation drive to support my campaign for progressive politics without much success so far. I also tried to cut down the projected campaign spending to the minimum. Since I couldn’t raise funds on my own, I knocked at yours and all other doors of our party’s Central leadership, urging them to commit the necessary Party funds for an impactful campaign … Like in 2014, I find a groundswell of popular support behind our party and my candidature … It is clear that only fund crunch is holding us back from a winning campaign in Puri. I regret that without party funding, it won’t be possible to carry out the campaign in Puri, I, therefore, return the INC ticket for the Puri Parliamentary Constituency herewith.”
Mohanty told The Indian Express on Saturday that she had requested the leadership to change some of the candidates in the seven Assembly segments that come under the Puri Lok Sabha seat. But this too was not considered, she added. The Lok Sabha and Assembly polls are simultaneously held in Odisha.
Puri is among the high-profile poll battles that will unfold in Odisha, with the BJP fielding its national spokesperson Sambit Patra for the second straight time and Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik’s BJD fielding former Mumbai Police commissioner Arup Patnaik.
In 2019, the Congress secured only 3.94% of the votes in Puri. This was way down from 2014, when Mohanty’s vote share was 18.5% and she finished second.
© The Indian Express Pvt Ltd
First uploaded on: 04-05-2024 at 12:26 IST
