The formula that worked for Naveen Patnaik in Odisha

Pramila Bisoi, the 70-year-old village leader of self-groups, who dropped out of school after class two, who speaks Berhampuri dialect of Odia, is headed to Parliament. Naveen’s mascot for the strong women vote bank of member of seven lakh self-help groups is leading by more than 26,000 votes.

Patnaik who said he was taking a first step towards reserving seats for women, had nominated seven women in 21 of Odisha’s Lok Sabha seats. Many in the Aska wondered how Bisoi would contribute in Parliament; Bisoi remained confident in her debut as politician telling one TV interviewer, if her fellow parliamentarians didn’t understand her, she’d sing to them. Patnaik’s grooming of women as an electoral constituency seems to have paid off.

Of the seven, six of his candidates were leading as of noon. In Jajpur, another debutant, a state government official Sharmistha Sethi was also far ahead of her competitors. Koraput, Keonjhar, Bhadrak are the other seats where BJD has women candidates. The one where the party was lagging behind, was in Sundargarh where Sunita Biswal daughter of former Congress CM, Hemanad Biswal, was behind BJP’s Minister of Tribal Affairs Jual Oram and Congress George Tirkey.