Bhubaneswar , April 30: Kalu Charan Khandayatray has recently resigned from Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), He expressed to contest as an independent candidate from the Khurda assembly seat.
When BJP announced its candidate for the Khurda assembly seat, Khandayatray was left disappointed. The party decided to field Prashant Jagdev, a former BJD leader and the sitting MLA from Chilika, as its candidate.
Feeling aggrieved by this decision, Khandayatray decided to take matters into his own hands.
Khandayatray claimed that BJP’s Bhubaneswar Lok Sabha candidate Aparajita Sarangi was responsible for excluding his name from the list of Assembly candidates.
In the 2019 elections, Khandayatray as BJP candidate secured over 75,000 votes in the Khurda assembly seat but narrowly lost to the BJD candidate.
His decision to contest as an independent candidate may have implications for both the Assembly seat and the Bhubaneswar Lok Sabha constituency.
The BJD has fielded Rajendra Sahoo from the Assembly seat and Manmath Routray from the Bhubaneswar Lok Sabha seat.
Sarangi’s camp has dismissed Khandayatray’s allegations as false and baseless.
Kalu Khandayatray’s decision to contest independently has added an interesting twist to Khurdha’s politics . His revolt against the BJP and accusations against Aparajita Sarangi have drawn attention as the state gears up for the elections
