With the Jharsuguda bypoll coming closer, three major political parties BJD, BJP and Congress have stepped up campaigning to woo voters.
BJD candidate Deepali Das, BJP’s Tankadhar Tripathi and Congress’s Tarun Pandey have started door-to-door campaigning with the promise of development. Incidentally all the three candidates are contesting for the first time.
Deepali is reaching out to voters with the report card of her late father Naba Kishore Das working in Jharsuguda. Similarly, Tankadhar and Tarun are trying to woo the voters with their respective strategies including incomplete development works in the constituency.
Apart from the efforts of the candidates, the three political parties are relying on social media to win the bypolls. Parties are using social media fiercely to win the hearts of voters. Senior leaders of BJD, BJP and Congress are camping in Jharsuguda and have started mobilizing party workers in both urban and rural areas of the constituency.
Sources said all the three parties have planned to hold big meetings led by star campaigners in different areas in the coming days. Sources said that due to defections in the Jharsuguda BJP and Congress units, the BJD seems to have an upper hand.
Recently, Mahendra Nayak, the Congress candidate in the last assembly election, quit the grand old party and joined the BJD. Similarly, BJP’s presidential candidate in the recently concluded municipal elections, Trinath Gual, joined the ruling party.
Political observers said the high-stakes bypoll will not only be a test for the three electoral rookies but will also set the tone for their respective parties in the run-up to the 2024 general elections next year. The bypoll was necessitated after the murder of minister and Jharsuguda MLA Naba Kishore Das in January this year.
Naba had registered a landslide victory in the 2019 elections with a vote share of 55.97 per cent. BJP and Congress got 30.04 and 10.68 percent votes respectively. Besides Deepali, Tankadhar and Tarun, six independent candidates are in the fray in the bypoll to be held on May 10.