Rattled Naveen revokes suspension

NEW DELHI, July 1: The 12-day crisis in the Biju Janata Dal BJD sparked by the suspension of five prominent party MLAs on June 19 ended, a...

NEW DELHI, July 1: The 12-day crisis in the Biju Janata Dal BJD sparked by the suspension of five prominent party MLAs on June 19 ended, at least for the time being, when party chief Naveen Patnaik revoked their suspension orders today.

The MLAs 8212; Pravat Tripathy, Surya Narayan Patra, Bijayshree Routray, Kalpataru Das and Bishnu Charan Das 8212; were suspended from the party on June 19 for their alleged role in causing the defeat of A U Singhdeo, the party8217;s official candidate in the Rajya Sabha elections. It was alleged that they had cross-voted in favour of one of the Congress candidates.

While revoking their suspension, Patnaik simultaneously requested the party8217;s disciplinary action committee 8220;to investigate all aspects, including acts of indiscipline, anti-party activities and overall reasons for Singhdeo8217;s defeat.8221;

The BJD president8217;s decision is seen as a climbdown, though, Naveen refused to concede that faced with a rebellion in his party, he was forced to soften his stand. 8220;The five MLAshad yesterday written a letter to me pledging their support and service to build a prosperous Orissa of Biju Babu8217;s dream,8221; he said. 8220;This prompted me to revoke their suspension orders.8221;Patnaik8217;s claim may only partially be true. His decision to suspend the five MLAs had, in fact, brought cracks in the party to the fore. Matters threatened to go out of control after Union Minister of State for Coal Dilip Kumar Ray and that BJD8217;s political affairs committee PAC chairman Bijoy Mahapatra opposed the suspensions.

And, with both camps refusing to budge from their respective stands, for a while it looked as if the party was headed for a split, especially after Patnaik made it clear that nothing sort of an apology from the MLAs would force him to revoke their suspension orders.

But the MLAs have refused to offer any apology. Instead, they sought to assuage their party president8217;s feelings by reaffirming their faith in his leadership. They sought to blame the crisis within the party on 8220;a communicationgap.8221;

Patnaik8217;s decision to revoke the suspension of the MLAs may have bought peace for the party but it remains to be seen how long the truce will hold. 8220;Such piece-meal measures can only solve the problems faced by the party for the time being,8221; summed up a party MP.

Story continues below this ad

BJD leaders expressed happiness over the revocation of suspension orders. 8220;The crisis has been resolved. There was misunderstanding in the party which has now been removed,8221; senior party MLA Amar Satpathy said.

All the five MLAs in the eye of the storm and other leaders talked to the media at the residence of the PAC chairman, Bijoy Mohapatra here this afternoon.

Asked to comment, Mohapatra said the crisis had blown over. 8220;Now we will try to rebuild the party8221;. Replying to a question as to whether he was optimistic of a solution, he said, 8220;I was never pessimistic.8221;