Bhubaneswar: Hours after snapping 23-year-old ties with BJP, Bhrugu Baxipatra, who was the vice-president of the saffron party in Odisha, joined the ruling BJD on Wednesday. He was inducted into the Conch fold in presence of senior BJD leaders Manas Mangaraj, Sasmit Patra, Chandrasekhar Sahu, and Bikram Panda.
Bhrugu’s joining has fuelled discussions in political circles that the regional party might field him for the Berhampur LS seat, having appointed the sitting MP, Chandrasekhar Sahu, to an organisational post earlier in the day.
The BJD has elevated Sahu to the rank of state vice president and also appointed him as chairman of its manifesto committee. Bhrugu had garnered an impressive 3.49 lakh votes from Berhampur in 2019 but lost to Sahu by a margin of around 94,000 votes.
The BJP has given its ticket for Berhampur parliamentary constituency to former minister Pradeep Panigrahi, who after being expelled from the BJD joined the BJP in February. He is pitted against Rashmi Ranjan Patnaik of Congress.