Subhas Chandra Pattanayak
By openly alleging that some of the Congress leaders have sabotaged the party in election, President of Orissa Pradesh Congress Committee Sri Jayadev Jena has conceded defeat even three weeks before the EVMs are to come to the counting tables. He is partially correct; because he has limited his allegations only to some unidentified Congress leaders of Orissa, whereas it is the central leadership of Congress that has sabotaged the Congress in Orissa again.
This election had tremendous possibilities of victory for the Congress. Everywhere there was a strong undercurrent against Naveen Patnaik. By orientation, people of Orissa are averse to the communalist BJP. Hence BJP was not supposed to benefit from the undercurrent against Naveen. On the other hand, none of the other parties – mostly, personal attires of Pyari Mohan Mohapatra (Orissa Jana Morcha), Soumya Ranjan Patnaik (Ama Odisha), Aira Kharavela Swain (Utkal Bharata) – and left parties with no serious approach to the election, were not expected to win. So, it was only the Congress that could have acquired most of Orissa Assembly seats this time.
But for Sonia Gandhi, Naveen was not to be defeated. Like every time since Naveen Patnaik has occupied Orissa, the so-called high command of Congress has sabotaged the electoral prospects of Congress in Orissa. Members of the Congress Party in Orissa are yet to decode this mystery.
Riding on sympathy wave on death of Biju Patnaik, a wave that, in fact, in order to show his magnanimity as chief Minister, J. B. Patnaik had created by eulogizing on the man whom people had disdainfully thrown into the dustbin of time, Naveen had given such a misrule, that, the people had started repenting for having him elected.
The astute politician J. B. Patnaik, in his new avatar as PCC chief, was quite efficiently and effectively steering the campaign against malfunctioning of the BJD-BJP government and many members of the cabinet, who had founded the BJD, were also getting disillusioned and irritated over the preening prince of Bijudom.
The situation had become so anarchic that the whole of Orissa was rising against Naveen.
At that juncture, Pyari Mohan Mohapatra had come to his rescue.
He had advised Naveen to dismiss some of his ministers, notwithstanding them being founder members of BJD, by giving an impression to the public that they were dismissed on grounds of corruption.
This single trick gave a new twist to public thinking on Naveen Patnaik, as they compared Naveen’s action against his close colleagues on allegations of corruption with J.B.Patnaik’s corruption-raj wherein fellows like Indrajit Ray and Basant Biswal were given full protection. This had immediately turned the rising public aversion to Naveen Patnaik into strong public admiration for him.
Yet, his conduct as Chief Minister was too deficient to fetch for him a fresh mandate.
POSCO had already put its eyes on Orissa by then; and for Sonia-led Congress, in that context, continuance of Naveen in the Chief Minister’s chair was more important than victory of its own candidates.
Congress high Command ensured defeat of the Congress in Orissa, not only by jettisoning J.B. Patnaik from the leadership of the province, but also by giving tickets to tainted fellows whom Naveen had dismissed on grounds of corruption.
In order to help Naveen rule the roost, Congress High Command had then appointed a lightweight Jayadev Jena as PCC Chief and used fellows like the Madhya Pradesh scrap Digvijaya Singh to damage whatever semblance of determination was still alive in Orissa PCC leaders to fetch victory for their Party.
Naveen recaptured power, simply because, there was no real opposition to him from the Congress.
However, when the lightweight Jayadev Jena, sans any ability to know how deep was Congress high command’s secret agenda to keep Naveen in the Gadi of Orissa, succeeded in bridging the gap between rival groups of the party and a new hope for success of Congress was discernible in the political horizon, he was suddenly replaced with K.P.Singhdeo, to save the people from the tyranny of whose family, the Congress Party spangled with the Communists in freedom movement, had made spellbinding sacrifices, Baisnab Patnaik absorbing the bullets and Baji Raut entering into martyrdom.
Promulgating himself as “soldier of Sonia Gandhi”, Singhdeo created such a climate that the election was lost to the Congress, when it was sure to win, had Jayadev Jena not been removed.
The Congress members and admirers were shocked to the core; but none of them could dare to confront the central leadership with this reality.
It was clear that KP was killing the Congress.
Howsoever feeble, voice against imposition of her “soldier” by Sonia on members of the Pradesh Congress gathered audible proportion and lest the secret agenda of Sonia to help the POSCO agent in power in Orissa get exposed, hoodwinking assurances were given to Orissa Congress members that no more the leadership would be imposed from above.
They were told to elect their own President and the process started from the block level.
But when the process had reached the final stage and only the PCC President was to be elected, it was clear to the Congress high command that Lalatendu Bidyadhar Mohapatra was sure to win. His election as PCC Chief was sure to be most disadvantageous to Naveen.
So, at the last moment, just before the election of the PCC chief, a Sonia emissary stymied the election and shepherded the PCC members to adopt a resolution authorizing Sonia Gandhi to decide who should head the PCC.
And eventually Sonia appointed Niranjan Patnaik to head the PCC.
Patnaik, though a seasoned politician, had also no idea that any strong campaign against Naveen was not to please Sonia to whom the South Korean POSCO was not to be displeased.
Jagdish Tytler was used to destroy the effect of the spectacular rally Niranjan had organized after taking over the PCC reign. Lest the rally be viewed as appropriate expression of mass resentment against Naveen’s misrule and a turning point in favor of the Congress, Tytler instigated enthusiasts to make force-entry into the Assembly, even as anti-Congress agent provocateurs were in their notorious best. Despite this, the legislative wing of the Congress was very ably exposing the Naveen misrule and to cite an instance, had devastated Naveen in the matter of pulse scandal. Sonia sent Tytler again to leash the legislative wing and to the utter frustration of every Congress MLA, their just steps against Naveen were forced to be withdrawn.
And, when election 2014 was due, Niranjan was discarded to revive Jayadev Jena as PCC chief!
Situation was made so sour that the Leader of Opposition Bhupinder Singh had to leave the Congress at the verge of election to seek an asylum in the camp of Naveen!
This site has all along exposed the motive of the Congress High Command based on circumstantial evidences. There are many disquisitions in these pages on this subject. But I would like you to peruse the following essays to get necessary glimpses of how the central leadership of Congress has continuously sabotaged the Orissa Pradesh Congress to ensure safe continuance of Naveen Patnaik in power. Jayadev Jena will specifically gain if he wants to find out who has really sabotaged the Congress in Orissa. Here are the essays:
Congress is confused
Elections ahead: Congress versus Congress in Orissa
Congress in suicide mode: Bizarre business in Orissa politics
Congress emerges as a party of contradictions in Orissa
Agents of foreign interest flock together: Congress denies tickets to active opponents of Naveen
Election of PCC Chief stopped since Lulu would be disadvantageous to Naveen
Tytler’s visit was meant to suppress the legislative conscience of CLP members
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