The recent killing of five innocent people during an anti-Maoist operation in Kandhamal district and subsequent reports about the death of 18 children due to malnutrition in Jajpur district have dented the Naveen Patnaik government’s image to a great extent. These two incidents are likely to affect the ruling BJD’s prospects in the panchayats elections in the State early next year for which the political parties have started preparing.
The killing of five people at Gumudumaha village and the death of many children due to malnutrition at Nagada village had snowballed into major controversies since tribal and Dalit groups, human rights organisations and social activists had also started criticising the Naveen Patnaik government in a big way along with the Opposition parties. The main Opposition parties – the Congress and the BJP – have also taken up both the issues with full force with leaders of both the parties making visits to the two villages and by organising bandh, protests and demonstrations. While Gumudumaha hit the headlines because innocent tribals and Dalits had fallen victim to the bullets of security personnel belonging to the Special Operation Group of the State police, Nagada had remained far from the eyes of the Jajpur district administration which had not been able to open an Anganwadi centre in the tribal hamlet till reports about the death of malnourished children started appearing in the media a few days ago.
The Congress has also demanded that the SOG jawans involved in the Gumudumaha killings be prosecuted under relevant provisions of IPC and those of the SC and ST (Prevention of Cruelty) Act. Both the villages, lacking proper road connectivity, had also exposed the BJD government’s tall claims of development in urban areas when the interior pockets continue to remain neglected. While one could walk down 14 km from the pucca road at Kurtamgarh to reach Gumudumaha, there was no road to Nagada located atop a hill and one has to walk at least 10 km uphill to reach the village. What had given an opportunity to the Opposition parties to take a dig at Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik is that the later has not visited either Gumudumaha or Nagada to take stock of the situation.
The Congress and the BJP are also planning to organise major rallies to highlight the issue of fake encounter and neglect of the tribals and Dalits in different parts of the State and the upcoming session of the State Assembly to embarrass the BJD government. Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi was also likely to visit Kandhamal in the near future as the party was working overtime to regain its strength in the tribal-dominated backward regions of Odisha.
Political analysts are of the view that Mr. Patnaik has to reach out to the people himself in order to restore his government’s sagging image since the bureaucrats on whom he was depending upon to run the administration were not in a position to handle the situation politically. The less said about Mr. Patnaik’s Ministers the better. A few months ago they faced opposition from Congress activists who threw eggs at them at many places in protest against large-scale irregularities in the issuance of ration cards under the National Food Security Act.
Now they are facing protest from BJP activists against the attack on the convoy of two Union Ministers in Bargarh district a few months ago. The spread of dengue fever in several district of the State and a few deaths due to diarrhoea in different districts in the recent weeks have further added to Mr. Patnaik’s woes. More than 1,500 people had been detected to have been affected by the fever and at least six persons have died so far.
