Six-time Cuttack MP Bhartruhari Mahtab joins BJP days after quitting BJD

Mahtab, 67, joined the BJP in the presence of senior leaders at the party headquarters here.

New Delhi: Days after the BJP announced that there will be no alliance with the BJD, Bhartruhari Mahtab joined the BJP along with other leaders. He had recently resigned from the BJD, a party he had co-founded and represented for six terms in Parliament.

He is likely to be fielded by the BJP from Cuttack. Along with him, actor Sidhant Mohapatra and noted Santali writer Damayanti Beshra also joined the BJP. 

He joined the party in the BJP headquarters in the presence of union minister Dharmendra Pradhan and senior leader Jay Panda. “My decision to snap my umbilical cord with BJD may be harsh but it has given me immense relief. This is because I had been living with a kind of pain. When it became unbearable, I took the decision,” he said. 

A year after the BJD was founded in 1997, the 67-year-old was elected to the Lok Sabha in 1998. Since then, he has represented his party in 2004, 2009, 2014, and 2019. He was the BJD’s floor leader in the Lok Sabha between 2014 and 2019, and was awarded the ‘Sansad Ratna’ consecutively from 2017 to 2020 for his outstanding performance in parliament debates.

The BJP, looking to increase its tally in Odisha, has been taking in several politicians from the state into its wing. This includes actor Arindam Roy, BJD MLA Arabinda Dhali and former MLA Mukunda Sodi. In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP won 8 of the 21 seats of the state while the BJD won 12.