Puri: When Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik inaugurated the heritage corridor around Puri’s 12th-century Jagannath temple on 17 January, just five days ahead of the Ram Mandir consecration in Ayodhya by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the symbolism of the move was not lost on most.
Puri is the land of the Jagannath, and the temple city holds immense symbolic significance — culturally and politically — for the ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD). With the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) slowly expanding its base in Odisha, the BJD did not want to leave anything to chance.
The BJD has been winning the Puri Lok Sabha seat since 1998. In 2019, of the seven assembly segments under the Puri parliamentary constituency, the BJD won five and the BJP the other two.
In this backdrop, as the Ram temple ‘pran pratishtha’ created a charged atmosphere ahead of election season, many saw the grand inauguration of the 75 metres-long Jagannath temple heritage corridor as an attempt by the ruling BJD to preempt the BJP’s Hindutva agenda in Odisha.
As ThePrint travelled to several assembly segments in the temple town of Puri, it found little resonance of the Ram Mandir on the ground. Among Odias, Modi matters, but CM Naveen Patnaik still holds sway despite being in power for nearly 25 years.
“For us, it’s only Jai Jagannath, nothing else,” said Rajkishore Mal (63), a farmer in Puri’s Baliguali village.
Niranjan Nayak (47), who runs a utensil shop near the Jagannath temple in Puri, said there have been a lot of changes in the temple precincts in the last five years.
“Earlier, the heritage corridor was not there. It was developed in the last five years. It is very good, but some other things need improvement. Like the pilgrims who come from outside, they get hassled. They have to stand under the sun for hours for a ‘darshan’ because the inside of the temple is very crowded,” said Nayak, whose family has lived near Jagannath temple for five generations.
Nayak added that whoever has Lord Jagannath’s blessings wins the elections in Puri. “Whoever Lord Jagannath wants, gets elected. But I think because of the Jagannath heritage corridor, BJD could benefit this time,” he said.
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‘Modi at Centre, Patnaik in state’
Most people ThePrint spoke with in Puri also distinguished between voting in the general and state elections. Odisha will have simultaneous Lok Sabha and assembly polls in four phases, starting 13 May.
“As long as I live, I will vote for Naveen Patnaik and the BJD in the state. And why not? From birth till death, Naveen babu’s government takes care of everything,” said Rajkishore Mal.
He, however, said Modi might be a better choice in the Lok Sabha election. “Modi did good work at the Centre. His government is strong and will keep the country intact,” he said.
Gadadhar Sahu (35), a resident of village Nirmala in the Pipli assembly segment of Puri, said, “BJD works. They have built roads and taken care of our children’s education and our medical needs.”
Asked about the Ram Mandir in Ayodhya, he said, “I have heard about the Ram temple. It’s good that the temple has been built. But, we have benefitted from the BJD.”
Senior journalist Rajesh Mahapatra, who tracks Odisha’s politics and economy, told ThePrint, “Puri is the land of Jagannath… Odisha is all about the syncretic Jagannath culture. Naveen Patnaik knows Puri’s symbolic value, which is why everything in the last five years has been about Lord Jagannath. The Jagannath temple corridor project was among the first temple beautification projects in the state that he took up after coming to power in 2019.”
Mahapatra said Patnaik wanted to preempt the Hindutva agenda by taking up temple upgrade/beautification projects across the state. “It’s this very Jagannath culture that does not allow Hindutva to have a hold in the state. It’s also why the Ram temple consecration ceremony does not have much resonance among the people here.”
Besides the Jagannath temple heritage corridor, the Patnaik-led BJD government has also taken up the upgradation of the Lingaraj temple in Bhubaneswar, Chandi temple in Cuttack, Samaleshwari temple in Sambalpur, and the Nrusinghanath temple in Bargarh, among others.
Former BJD MP Tathagata Satpathy said the Ram Mandir saga is limited to a certain level in society. “If you go to any village in Odisha, you will never see a Ram temple anywhere. There will be mostly a Gramdevi (local deity) temple. This is the main temple. And you will find a second temple of Jagannath,” Satpathy, the editor of Odia newspaper Dharitri, told ThePrint.
“Nowhere will you find a Ram temple. For the Odia Hindus, it has always been the ‘matru shakti (mother’s power)’ that is bigger. And, the mother figure, in a way, has thwarted the inroad of the politics based on religion,” added Satpathy.
He said the BJP could not understand this nuanced difference because it probably thinks that the North Indian ideology works everywhere. “So, they (BJP) could not work around this. They could not twist it in their favour. That continues even now, and today also, Ram is not a big issue in Odisha,” he said.
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‘Puri seat will not be a cakewalk’
In the 2019 Lok Sabha election, BJD’s Pinaki Misra defeated BJP’s Sambit Patra by a slender margin of around 11,000 votes. This time, BJD has replaced Misra with former Mumbai top cop Arup Patnaik for the Puri seat.
In 2019, Arup Patnaik contested the Bhubaneshwar seat and lost to BJP’s Aparajita Sarangi by over 21,000 votes.
Mahapatra said that despite the BJD government’s signature Jagannath heritage corridor project, the Puri Lok Sabha seat will not be a cakewalk for BJD. “It’s going to be a tough contest between BJD candidate Arup Patnaik and BJP’s Sambit Patra,” he said.
Satpathy said it was a clever strategy for the BJD to go for temple upgrade and beautification projects, with which it has seen some success. “But it (poll results) will be difficult to predict now. We can all see on June 4, but I think there is some success in the whole scenario, and the Hindutva onslaught has not been that harsh in Odisha. The attack has been there, but the sharp edge has been blunted,” he said.
The former BJD MP said the BJP has grown in Odisha because the Congress has crumbled. “And with the Congress crumbling, much of the worker base has shifted to BJP. Because, when they (workers) are opposing the local government of BJD, where else do they go?” he said.
The BJP’s growth in Odisha has been remarkable. From winning just one LS seat in 2014 with 21.88 percent vote share, the party increased its tally to 8 seats — 38.4 percent vote share — in 2019. In the assembly elections too, the BJP went from winning 10 out of 147 seats in 2014 to winning 23 seats in 2019.
Asked if the BJD’s temple beautification projects were an attempt to counter the BJP’s Hindutva agenda, Arup Patnaik, the party’s Puri candidate, said Naveen Patnaik is not the kind to indulge in such gimmicks for a checkmate. “… he will never do it. I don’t think anyone believes that either,” he told ThePrint.
The former top Mumbai cop said Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik is a devotee of Lord Jagannath. “He is a big believer so he won’t do these things (gimmicks) ever. Naveen Patnaik does not react to other things. He does his own thing. The way I know him from far, he is a man with full equanimity, full scholarship, dedication, and a tremendous amount of empathy for the people of Odisha,” Arup Patnaik said.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
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