Even as the speculations over a possible alliance between Odisha’s ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) continued for over a week now, BJP Lok Sabha member and former Union minister Jual Oram on Monday tried to allay the confusion of their cadres by saying that “appropriate decision” decision will be taken by the party’s central leadership at the “right time.” Speaking to reporters on Monday, Oram said, “There was no confusion among party workers over any alliance. We have sent a list of Lok Sabha and assembly candidates to the party’s central leadership and everything will be done as per their decision.” His statement came on the heels of Odisha State BJP President Manmohan Samal’s visit to Delhi on Monday morning. As per reports, Samal left for Delhi following a meeting of the party core committee and the election committee on Saturday. It is believed that he went to Delhi with the list of probable candidates for the upcoming elections prepared in the election committee meeting. However, the final list of candidates will be prepared once the candidates are shortlisted from the existing list. Moreover, the BJP parliamentary board will take a final call on who will be BJP’s candidate from where. The meeting of the BJP state office-bearers went on till late in the night last Saturday. The details were discussed in the core committee and election committee meetings. The state BJP has reportedly finalised candidates for all Assembly and Lok Sabha seats. In the afternoon, a meeting was convened at Naveen Niwas in the evening with BJD observers and party leaders of the Puri parliamentary constituency. The leaders include Arun Sahu, Sanjay Dasburma, Rudra Maharathy, Umakant Samantray and Satya Pradhan among others. BJD candidate Pinaki Misra had won from Puri LS Constituency in 2019 by a small margin of around 11,000 votes against BJP’s Sambit Patra. The BJD is said to be focusing on Puri to increase its vote share and the margin of win this time around.



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