Indus Valley Times

The three political parties have left no stone unturned to convert these properties as canvases to create visual impacts on voters.  

By Mahendra Darjee

Brajarajnagar, May 27 : Brajarajnagar assembly constituency in Odisha, apart from currently witnessing a fierce triangular fight involving the three political parties such as the ruling BJD and the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Congress; is seeing a completely different and yet strange battle on the ground.

It’s the battle for roadside signage posts and trees to use them as high-value election campaign properties.

The three political parties have left no stone unturned to convert these properties as canvases to create visual impacts on voters.  Hundreds of flags of the three political parties are seen fluttering flawlessly in the hot summer winds.  

What is quite interesting is that the three political parties have ensured that the flags put out by them on the signage posts flutter well above the signs portrayed on them and do not obstruct the commuters to read the signs indicating humps ahead, right turn, left turn, school and institutional areas; blow no horn and U-turn ahead.

Sources said that the Biju Janata Dal was the first party to adopt this novel strategy of using the signage posts and trees to create a visual impact on the mind of the commuters. The ruling party did this on the advice of the campaign planners and poll strategists. Not to lag behind. The BJP and Congress followed the suit immediately.

There are some signage posts and trees where flags, banners and posters of the three parties are seen overlapping, signalling their importance in visual message transmission.

The BJD flag carries the conch symbol. The BJP and Congress flags respectively carry lotus and hand symbols.   

The BJD has fielded Alaka Mohanty, the widow of Kishore Mohanty who represented the seat before his untimely death in December 2021 due to cardiac arrest. 

The BJP has landed former MLA Radharani Panda while Kishore Patel, the former Speaker of Odisha Legislative Assembly, is trying his luck on the Congress ticket.

Though the leaders of three political parties claimed that they would win the bypoll, most of the voters that this correspondent met on Thursday said the result of this battle could not be predicted as all the three contenders were fighting it out quite seriously on the ground.

In the 2019 election the BJD candidate Kishore Mohanty had won the seat by a margin of 12,000 votes by defeating the BJP’s Radharani Panda. The present Congress nominee Kishore Patel had opted out of the contest on health grounds.