The BJD won 51 seats, the INC won 14 and the CPI(M) won one seat. Independent candidates won three seats. With 78 seats, the BJP won four more seats over the majority mark. Anti-incumbency, BJP’s dig at Patnaik’s health, Odia pride and Modi’s attack against Patnaik’s Tamil aide V. K. Pandian, and BJP’s comment about the missing keys to the Jagannath temple seem to have paid off. The keys had gone missing six years back.
The BJP won all seats in the Mayurbhanj district, where President Droupadi Murmu comes from. The BJP bastion districts in Western Odisha were also won again this year. Naveen Patnaik won in the Hinjli constituency, but lost in Kantabanji.
BJP’s seat share at 78 was the highest since 1995 and BJD’s the lowest since its first election in 2004. The Congress increased its seat share from nine in 2019 to 14 this year. However, it was still lower than the 16 seats it won in 2014.
Like seat share, the BJP’s vote share this year was the highest since 1980 at 40.07%. The BJD’s vote share was 40.22% and the INC registered the lowest vote share since 1980 at 13.26%.
When it comes to incumbent MLA performance, more than half of the 97 incumbent candidates lost. The party was initially expected to field new faces to tackle anti-incumbency. In fact, initial surveys indicated a decline in the popularity of incumbent MLAs across almost all districts, according to party sources. Moreover, younger leaders who began their careers alongside these existing leaders were becoming increasingly aspirational. However, the BJD decided to play safe by retaining many incumbent MLAs.
Of the 66 incumbent MLAs it fielded, 41 lost. On the other hand, the BJP fielded 25 incumbents, 10 of whom lost.
Incumbent candidates won or lost by margins as low as around 30 votes. For instance, senior BJD leader Nrusingha Charan Singh lost by 32 votes to the BJP candidate in the Parjanga constituency.
Seven cabinet ministers lost, while five won.
One such incumbent is the Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, who lost from the Kantabanji constituency. by a margin of 16,344 votes to the BJP candidate. He won from Hinjli with a margin of 4,636 votes. This is after his previous victories in the Hinjli constituency with margins of 61,273 (2009), 76,586 (2014), and 60,160 (2019) in previous assembly elections. His vote share, too, dipped considerably this election, decreasing from the high of 76.04% in 2009 to 46.85% this year.
(With input from agencies)
