– Arun Puri
I have always considered Naveen Patnaik to be a bit of a miracle of Indian politics. Although his father, the veteran former Chief Minister of Odisha, Biju Patnaik, was a strong political figure, Naveen had no interest in politics.
He was more interested in writing books, travelling and socialising with international stars like Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and rock-star Mick Jagger. He was educated in elite schools and lived a life of luxury, far away from the dust and grime of politics.
So, when he decided to take over his father’s legacy after his death in 1997, there were doubts about his ability to master the manipulations of Odia politics. He could only speak the local language brokenly. So, when Naveen took over as the Chief Minister in March 2000 at the age of 53, it seemed that failure was knocking at his door.
But as if by some miracle, he is not only still in power after 24 years, but is also on the cusp of electoral greatness. Naveen, a five-time chief minister, is hopeful that he will break all records by winning a sixth consecutive term for his party, the Biju Janata Dal (BJD), and for himself. If he manages to do so, Naveen will surpass Pawan Chamling’s record of 24 years and 165 days in Sikkim as the longest-serving chief minister in the country by August. But if he does not win, this will probably be the 77-year-old’s last election. He is on the verge of making history or becoming history.
Undoubtedly, this is the toughest electoral battle for Naveen so far. Elections are being held simultaneously for 21 Lok Sabha seats and 147 assembly seats in Odisha. The political arithmetic of both is different, but intertwined with each other. Especially because the main contender is the same.
Naveen’s BJD faces the formidable and popular Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. In 2014, the BJD won a landslide victory in the assembly elections and won 20 out of 21 Lok Sabha seats despite the Modi wave. But in 2019, Naveen started to feel the tough competition.
Naveen retained his seats in the assembly with a two-thirds majority, but the BJP won eight of the 21 parliamentary seats. Its vote share rose to 38 per cent, just five per cent less than the BJD. But the gap was higher in the assembly. Still, the BJP managed 32 per cent of the vote while the BJD got 45 per cent.
This time in the 2024 elections, Naveen is moving ahead with a positive agenda. On the contrary, the BJP is fuelling rumours by making personal attacks on him regarding his health. Naveen may not be seen much on public platforms, but he has achieved many successes in his 24 years in power.
When he took over, Odisha was among the poorest states in the country, with 63.8 per cent of the population below the poverty line even in 2006. Today, the figure is 11.07 per cent. Perhaps nowhere in the country has such a sharp decline in poverty been seen. Currently, Odisha’s per capita income is Rs 1.6 lakh, which is higher than other backward states like Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal and Jharkhand.
Its GDP growth rate last year was 7.8 per cent, higher than the national average of 7 per cent. Odisha is also a rare state with a unique fiscal management system, with a debt-to-GDP ratio of 13.1, the lowest in the country. It has a revenue surplus of Rs 43,471 crore. Much of this comes from policy changes that allowed the auction of the state’s vast mineral resources.
This cash surplus has allowed Naveen to spend heavily on welfare programmes. This has led to providing digital blackboards in the state’s high schools and building state-of-the-art sports facilities. In fact, Odisha is now a hub of national and international hockey. Naveen has also focused on revamping hospitals and launched the Biju Swasthya Kalyan Yojana (BKSY), a follow-up to the Centre’s Ayushman Bharat.
The BKSY card provides free treatment up to Rs 5 lakh per person in private hospitals. In terms of women empowerment, he implemented 50 per cent reservation for women in Panchayati Raj institutions in 2011. Then, the Mission Shakti scheme for women entrepreneurs through self-help groups has changed the lives of more than 70 lakh women.
All these successes have been possible because of Naveen’s straightforward, straightforward, minimum rhetoric and maximum action style. He stayed in Odisha and focused on the development of his state, rarely travelled to Delhi or abroad and relied mainly on top bureaucrats to implement his vision, while keeping a tight rein on his party leaders. The BJP is projecting these unique qualities as his biggest weakness. It alleges that non-Odia IAS officers are running the state and that Naveen is incompetent and forgetful. Most of the criticism has been directed at his former private secretary V. Karthikeya Pandian. Pandian resigned from the IAS in October 2023, joining the BJD.
He was given cabinet rank and appointed chairman of the state’s flagship ‘5T’ programme. Modi also indirectly criticised Pandian in a recent election rally, saying, “Odisha has a super CM who dominates over the democratically elected CM and MLAs.”
The BJP has made the restoration of Odia ‘identity’ its main election plank and vowed to prevent ‘outsiders’ like the Tamil-origin Pandian from taking control of the state. Group editorial director Raj Chengappa visits Odisha to gauge the tone of this crucial electoral battle.
The electoral battle for the state has intensified as Prime Minister Modi has announced that the BJP will form the next state government and is aggressively trying to increase its number of seats in the Lok Sabha. What is most interesting is that this is a battle between two very popular leaders-one national and the other regional.
– Aroon Purie, Editor-in-Chief and Chairman (India Today Group)