The journey of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) chief minister-elect for Odisha, Mohan Charan Majhi, all the way from a Guruji in Saraswati Sishu Vidya Mandir in a remote village of Keonjhar district to Raj Bhawan, was arduous.
When he was unanimously elected as the leader of the BJP Legislative Party on Tuesday afternoon, he looked bewildered and yet to recover from the shock of losing his personal assistant a few hours prior in a tragic road accident.
Soon after getting chosen as the chief minister, Majhi went to Raj Bhawan on Tuesday evening, accompanied by Union Ministers Rajnath Singh and Bhupender Yadav, to stake his claim. With 78 of its candidates winning the Assembly elections and with the support of three independents, the BJP’s number stands at 81 out of 147.
Although his name was being loosely discussed as the probable chief ministerial candidate, he finally emerged as the dark horse with BJP central leadership choosing to flaunt a tribal leader to head the state. He will, of course, have two deputy chief ministers in the venerable K V Singhdeo and the first-timer Pravati Parida.
The 52-year-old Majhi, who won from Keonjhar Sadar seat for the fourth time in the Assembly, is quite an experienced politician, having risen from the grassroots with his RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh) background. His political career began as a sarpanch in the mineral-rich Keonjhar district dominated by tribal communities.
A law graduate, Majhi dedicated his life to social service and emerged as a no-nonsense and firebrand political figure. His conduct in the Assembly as deputy chief whip of the BJD (Biju Janata Dal) and BJP coalition government, and subsequently as the opposition chief whip from 2019 to 2024 was extremely sharp and noteworthy.
Humble but strident, he made a mark for himself as somebody who fought for the causes of the tribals and against the neglect of his district by the Naveen Patnaik government, which contributes a significant amount of revenue to the state exchequer by way of mining royalty and cess.
He is going to be the third tribal chief minister after Hemananda Biswal and Giridhar Gomango, both from the Congress party, whose stints lasted only for a few months. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, known for his masterstrokes, kept his promise to install a true Odia as the chief minister and played the tribal card for the second time as far as Odisha is concerned.
The president of India, Draupadi Murmu, who is also a tribal, hails from the adjacent district of Mayurbhanj. Keonjhar and Mayurbhanj are the two northern Odisha districts, both dominated by the tribals, bordering Jharkhand and West Bengal respectively.
Incidentally, both Majhi and Murmu belong to the Santal community and the leadership has been assigned for the first time to north Odisha, a tract historically neglected. It is an appeasement of the tribals along with Jual Oram being the new Union Tribal Affairs Minister.
The swearing-in ceremony will take place on Wednesday evening, 12 June, at Janata Maidan in Bhubaneswar, the preparation for which has been going on for the last five days. Prime Minister Modi, many BJP bigwigs, and chief ministers from the party are scheduled to attend the ceremony in a state where the BJP will form its first government.
Though K V Singh Deo’s vast political and administrative experience would be an asset for Majhi, the BJP has a daunting task ahead in the Assembly with a very strong Opposition. The outgoing BJD has 51 members and the Congress has 14. The other deputy chief minister, Pravati Parida, is a woman and an OBC.
Therefore, the BJP has made a neat attempt to balance the regional aspirations of north, west, and coastal Odisha besides giving priority to women amongst other considerations. Parida, though a first-timer, has rich organisational experience as the president of the state unit of the BJP's Mahila Morcha.
Majhi is going to be the 15th chief minister of Odisha and has had quite a non-controversial career. While he must be still struggling mentally to accept the huge responsibility bestowed on him, he seems a good choice for the job, given his RSS background and for staying clear of factional politics.
(Srimoy Kar is a senior journalist based in Odisha. This is an opinion piece and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)
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