Pruthvi hints at ‘son rise’ in dad JB’s seat

  • | Wednesday | 13th March, 2019

JB, a three-time chief minister and former Assam governor, and Jayanti, a three-time MP, also have two daughters. JB died of a heart attack on April 21, 2015.Interestingly, Begunia constituency in Khurda district was a Congress stronghold during JB’s rule. Their son-in-law, Soumya Ranjan Patnaik, is currently a BJD Rajya Sabha member and the younger brother of Niranjan Patnaik, state president of Congress. “I want Congress to win in Begunia, as well as across Odisha. I will try my best if the party considers me worthy of a ticket.

Bhubaneswar: Pruthvi Ballav, the 42-year-old son of former chief minister and Congress stalwart Janaki Ballav ‘JB’ Patnaik, has expressed his desire to make his political debut in this election.Pruthvi, a businessman and a social worker, on Tuesday hinted that he wouldn’t be averse to a Congress ticket from the Begunia assembly seat, which was twice represented by his father, in 1995 and 2004. “I want Congress to win in Begunia, as well as across Odisha. I will try my best if the party considers me worthy of a ticket. The people of Begunia support me,” Pruthvi said, adding, “I had no interest in politics earlier.”Pruthvi’s inclination for politics assumes significance as none barring his parents — JB and Jayanti — were in politics. JB, a three-time chief minister and former Assam governor, and Jayanti, a three-time MP, also have two daughters. Their son-in-law, Soumya Ranjan Patnaik, is currently a BJD Rajya Sabha member and the younger brother of Niranjan Patnaik, state president of Congress. JB died of a heart attack on April 21, 2015.Interestingly, Begunia constituency in Khurda district was a Congress stronghold during JB’s rule. The party started losing grip over it following its downfall in Odisha in the late Nineties. JB’s contacts and groundwork in Begunia, too, stopped being of much use after he was appointed governor of Assam from 2009 to 2014.The Congress’s Pradeep Sahoo and Debasis Patnaik unsuccessfully contested from the Begunia assembly seat in 2009 and 2014, respectively. The BJD’s Prasanta Kumar Jagadev won Begunia in 2014 whereas former Nationalist Congress Party leader Prashanta Nanda, now in BJD, won it in 2009.Congress leaders hope that Pruthvi’s launch in Begunia would benefit the party, notwithstanding a series of controversies that had plagued his father when he was chief minister. Party state president Niranjan Patnaik said finalization of tickets was under way.

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