What appears very clear is that the Biju Janata Dal(BJD), which lost power in the 2024 elections to the Bharatiya Janata Party(BJP) is yet not able to shed its political and mental subjugation towards the NDA at the Centre.

What was extremely manifested in a debate in the Rajya Sabha the other day when four of its Rajya Sabha members spoke in favour of the ‘operation sindoor’ with logics that were built-in on BJP led propaganda to paper over several failures in essence and in their nuances to support BJP with eyes closed. Like many of those ‘Andh bhaktas’ caricaturing on Operation Sindoor but not a word to deal with the American President.

The RS members who went overboard holding the briefs of the Modi-led NDA were, Dr.Sasmit Patra, Sulata Deo, Manas Mangaraj and one more as if someone was holding a baton from behind them.

“Even some BJD loyalists were left pondering over the conscientious dearth in the deliberation of the aforesaid members who, perhaps, were forced to lose sight of the unprecedented flaws in handling the situations and mishandling foreign policy challenges during the skirmishes between India and Pakistan which has positioned India in an indefensible spot world wide” said Ritik Pramanik, political analyst and commentator.      

While, on the other hand, what is clear is that the entire operation/ exercise was throttled by so many points that were in public domain and were repeated by the opposition in both the Houses of the parliament but the NDA turned tone-deaf with its replies going off the tangents of realities at the bottom.     

What further fuelled the doubts about the mental subservience of Naveen Patnaik and some of his cohorts when two other Rajya Sabha MPs, Munna Khan and Debasih Samantaray, virtually contradicted the BJD leadership’s stance signaling that they cannot support the NDA being obsequiously submissive before all on the topic . So, they were asked to abstain from the debate.

Who was the driving force behind such diktats?

Munna Khan was the member who had spoken bluntly against the NDA government on the Waqf bill that has exposed some fissures within the BJD.

And the ones arguing in favour of the Waqf Bill were the same lot like Sasmit Patra who was louder than many in the Upper house to stand by the NDA piloted Wakf Amendment Bill and tried to justify himself saying it was a call of the ‘conscience’.  

Khan was decisively opposed to the Waqf amendment bill and was for a while had to remain spotted by the BJD leadership.

If Waqf bill voting was a call of ‘conscience’ then Patra has to explain over his stand on ‘Operation Sindoor ‘ debate if it was call of conscience or obsequiously submissive syndrome which the BJD had been a victim of for last 24 years of its rule almost genuflecting before the BJP for reasons best known to the drivers of the BJD juggernaut. They were ever ready to offer submissive and slavish devotion to Modi for political survival then and now also .

Were they the often said scams in mining and Ponzi that bother the BJD?

Looking back at several occasions when BJD with a sizable presence in Lok Sabha, then,  and Rajya Sabha had extended its support for Modi forcing many political analysts to find out the scruples behind it. When Naveen Patnaik was active and calling a few shots once in a while.

“It is obvious that now Patnaik is no longer on the driving seat, which he had left to the bureaucrat turned politician V K Pandian who could be singularly blamed for the debacle in 2024 polls” underscored Pramanik.

A notional atmosphere is given space in political discourses that Pandian had taken ‘sanyas’ from politics but that was a mere mirage for people. He was always there and is still there with Patnaik and now he has come out openly to reclaim his stature in the BJD.

“ It would be wrong to assume that Pandian is out on ‘sanyaas’ but, in essence, now the ‘sanyaasi’, it appears, is back with a baton  instead of a bowl but, somehow, wearing an invisible saffron attire and doing what he is assigned to do by the central leadership of the BJP” that was a cryptic take from Kameswar Rao, senior journalist and political analyst.

This game of obeisance by BJD towards the NDA or BJP is as old as 25 years since Patnaik led the BJD and vowed his allegiance to the BJP and now it is clear who are the architects of this design that threatens to politically decay the BJD despite a huge arithmetic in its favour in the Assembly.

Now the BJD is being skewed to remain submissive regardless of 51 members in Assembly of 147 is for all to see that sooner or later the Congress would reap the political benefits in Odisha.

Let’s not blame the foot shoulders in the BJD and rather focus on the ones masquerading as game changers in the apparatus and guess who they are!

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