Samikhsya Bureau
The 2019 general elections will be remembered for switchover of political leaders from one party to another.
For some leaders, it is a habit to leave a particular party to join another. Some others have some genuine grievances against those controlling their party and thus have no option to leave it. Yet some others switch over to another party in the expectations of greener pasture.
It is bad that leaders, who have been MLAs or MPs for several terms, quit the party after being denied tickets. But Arjun Charan Sethi is of the worst kind.
Sethi, 77, who has represented Bhadrak in Lok Sabha for eight times, not only quit the Biju Janata Dal but also openly said that he was “hurt’ that he or his son was not given tickets by the party. He later joined the Bhartiya Janata Party. He accused the BJD of having no transparency in ticket distribution.
It is quite well known that political parties are full of politicians who push for their sons, daughters and wife during elections. It is also a fact that many such politicians are switching sides after being denied ticket by one party or offered by another. It is all opportunistic.
But the more shameless will also openly say that only they or their sons or daughters have the exclusive right over party tickets. Sethi has always benefited by the BJD and its earlier avatar Janata Dal. He was even made a minister in the NDA-1 headed by prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee.
He was elected to the Lok Sabha for the first time in 1971 as a Congress candidate. In 1980, he was again elected on a Congress candidate. In 1991, he won again from Bhadrak as a Janata Dal candidate. From 1998 to 2014, he represented Bhadrak as a Biju Janata Dal member.
People in Bhadrak say that in the last three elections, Sethi was just riding piggy-back on Naveen Patnaik’s popularity, though he was getting unpopular. But even after getting benefited by the party and its leader for so long, leaders like Sethi are too concerned about themselves and their politics revolves around their family members. That is why they give the party “so when I am denied ticket because I am old, my son should be given and no one else” kind of ultimatum.
Had his son been given a ticket by the BJD, Sethi would have stayed back and the ticket distribution would have been transparent!
Why are we still talking about only Gandhi family?
