As Patnaik vows ‘no more support to BJP’, a brief history of BJD backing for Modi govt in 10 years
The Biju Janata Dal (BJD) has announced that it would stop giving “issue-based support” to the BJP in Parliament. BJD chief and ex-Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik held a meeting with his party’s nine Rajya Sabha MPs on Monday, asking them to ensure that the party goes all out to “protect the interests of Odisha” and emerges as a “strong and vibrant” Opposition in Parliament.
The BJD has nine MPs in the Upper House, even as it failed to win any Lok Sabha seat out of the state’s 21 seats in the recent elections, which is a first for the party since its formation in 1997.
According to the BJD camp, Patnaik’s message to his Rajya Sabha MPs was: “No more support to BJP, only opposition”. This is a marked shift from the party’s stand in the last 10 years.
During the first two terms of the Narendra Modi-led government during 2014-24, the BJD had come to its rescue in Parliament and outside on a range of issues multiple times.
Be it the Presidential elections in 2017 and 2022 or the passage of crucial legislations in the Rajya Sabha, where the BJP lacks the majority, the Patnaik-led party threw its weight behind the BJP dispensation. It earned the tag of being a “trusted ally of BJP” in the process despite not being formally part of the BJP-led NDA.
The BJD and the BJP even made attempts to form an alliance for the recent simultaneous Lok Sabha and Assembly polls in Odisha. That did not materialise, while the election results saw the BJP storming to power in the state, ending the five-term reign of the BJD. The BJP also won 19 Lok Sabha seats.
Presidential elections in 2017, 2022
A phone call from PM Modi to then Odisha CM Patnaik ensured that the BJD supported the NDA’s presidential candidate Ram Nath Kovind in the 2017 presidential polls. Patnaik, whose party had then 20 MPs in the Lok Sabha and 117 MLAs in the Assembly, announced their support for Kovind.
In the 2022 Presidential poll, Patnaik walked an extra mile to garner support for the NDA’s candidate Droupadi Murmu as she hails from Odisha. After Murmu was named the NDA’s Presidential nominee, Patnaik also tried to build a consensus among all Odisha legislators cutting across party lines in favour of her candidature.
Although in 2017, Patnaik supported the Opposition’s Vice-President candidate Gopalkrishna Gandhi, who is known to be his friend, he backed the NDA’s Vice-Presidential nominee Jagdeep Dhankhar in 2022.
Support on contentious issues
When the Modi government announced demonetisation in November 2016, Patnaik had said the proposal had been a long-time public suggestion to the panel of the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT). He added the Centre had shown the political will to implement it.
The BJD also endorsed the Modi government’s bid to bring the GST Bill for passage in July 2016, a major move to reform the tax structure of the country.
In August 2019, the BJD supported a resolution in the Rajya Sabha to scrap Article 370 in Jammu and Kashmir.
BJD was among other regional parties such as the AIADMK and the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) who extended support to the contentious Citizenship (Amendment) Bill in the Rajya Sabha in December 2019. The support came despite the BJD’s concern over a few provisions. BJD leader Sasmit Patra had then said that the CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act) and the National Register of Citizens (NRC) are two different issues and that the Bill should not be viewed through a communal lens.
In August last year, the BJD also declared its support for the National Capital Territory of Delhi (Amendment) Bill, which bolstered the Centre’s hold on the capital’s administration. The BJD also announced to vote against the no-confidence motion against the Modi government that was then moved by the Opposition parties.
The BJD also supported the NDA in the Rajya Sabha for the passage of other contentious laws such as the Bill on the appointment of Chief Election Commissioner and Election Commissioners and the RTI (Amendment) Bill, among others.
In June 2022, when protests erupted over the Centre’s Agnipath scheme across the country including in Odisha, the BJD leaders hailed the Centre’s scheme as a “brilliant” move.
Backing Vaishnaw’s RS candidature
Even as the BJD had the numbers in the state Assembly to win all three Rajya Sabha seats in June 2019, Patnaik announced his party’s support for the BJP’s nominee Ashwini Vaishnaw, then a former bureaucrat from Odisha.
The BJD maintained that its support to Vaishnaw’s candidature was in the larger interests of the state. Vaishnaw was then inducted into the Union Cabinet and was given the Railways, Communications and Electronics and Information Technology ministries.
In February 2024, the regional party again announced support for Vaishnaw’s candidature, paving way for his election for second term in the Upper House. Immediately after the BJP officially named Vaishnaw as its candidate, the BJD said it would support Vaishnaw “for the larger interest of the state’s railway and telecom development". In Modi’s third term, Vaishnaw has again been entrusted with the charge of the same ministries.
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