Naveen Patnaik, Odisha chief minister and president of the Biju Janata Dal (BJD), said his party would contest the 2024 Lok Sabha elections on its own as always. He made the comments two days after meeting Nitish Kumar, JD(U) president and Bihar chief minister, who was in Bhubaneswar as part of his effort to create a unified opposition front for the 2024 elections.
Asked if BJD would contest the LS elections alone, Patnaik said, “That has always been the case. ” He added that he had no plan of meeting any other leader during his trip to Delhi. On his meeting with Nitish, Patnaik said,“It was a courtesy call, he paid a visit. It went off well.” Asked about the possibility of a ‘third front’ emerging, he said, “ No, not as far as I'm concerned, not now. ”
Patnaik and Nitish had said that no discussions were held on any political alliance between JD(U) and BJD for the 2024 elections.
While the BJD has consistently kept a distance from any alliance led by the Congress, it has also avoided the BJP-led NDA since it exited the coalition in 2009, just before the Lok Sabha elections, ending an 11-year relationship with the saffron party.
Patnaik has been at the helm in Odisha since 2000 and his BJD is among those regional parties, which have maintained a neutral stand on issues on which BJP and the opposition parties have clashed. However, BJD has on many occasions bailed out the Modi government in Parliament by supporting bills and issues.