BHUBANESWAR: Rejection of the demand for awarding special category state (SCS) status to Odisha by the Centre has provided a fresh ammo to the BJD in the run-up to Umerkote byelection where it is running out of issues to corner the Congress and the BJP.The slogan of central neglect, which had receded to the background, has again come to the fore after the decision of the Centre to give SCS status to Bihar overlooking the claims of Odisha. That the issue has come in handy for the BJD can be gauged from the speeches of the Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik at Umerkote and Raighar where he addressed election meetings on Friday.With the Chief Minister hitting the campaign trail, the morale of the BJD has got a much-needed boost. Besides special category state status issue, Naveen also raised the corruption issues at the meetings. Former chief ministers of two BJP- ruled states and UPA-II ministers have been put behind bars over corruption charges, he highlighted.The BJD is under attack from the Congress and the BJP for a number of scams during Naveen’s third tenure. In the latest controversies, a senior minister was found availing more than one house under the discretionary quota while another allegedly undervalued his properties. Several BJD leaders in-charge of the campaigning, however, maintained that after the Chief Minister’s public meetings, there is no doubt about the victory of Subhas Gond, the party’s candidate. They maintained that the rice at ` 2-a-kg scheme and other welfare measures, including bicycles for school students, have come in handy for the BJD. Despite the high profile campaign of the Opposition political parties, it is very difficult to make a dent in the tribal vote bank because of the measures taken by the State Government, a senior Congress leader, campaigning for the party candidate, admitted.The focus of the three candidates of three major political parties has now centred on Bengali voters who constitute a little over 10 per cent of the electorate. As schedules of Congress leaders from West Bengal for campaigning to woo the Bengalis are yet to be finalised, the party has fallen back on Nimai Sarkar, a former MLA who was denied ticket in 2009 elections. The OPCC general secretary Arya Kumar Gyanendra said several leaders from adjoining Chhattisgarh are campaigning for the party candidate Jeeten Gond in the constituency. The leaders include a former president of the Chhattisgarh Congress Committee.
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