Bhubaneswar, April 22: Biju Janata Dal (BJD) president Naveen Patnaik revealed candidates for an additional six Assembly seats in Odisha on Monday.

The party has nominated sitting Dhenkanal MP Mahesh Sahoo for Hindol, Archanarekha Behera for Raghunathpali, Sarada Prasanna Jena for Balikuda-Ersama, Ranjita Marndi for Bangiriposi, and Biswaranjan Mallick for Bari. Tusharkanti Behera, the incumbent MLA, has been renominated for Kakatpur.

Five sitting MLAs have been omitted from the list, including Sudam Marndi (Bangiriposi), Subrat Tarai (Raghunathpali), Seemarani Nayak (Hindol), Raghunandan Das (Balikuda-Ersama), and Sunanda Das (Bari).

In Bangiriposi, Sudam Marndi has been replaced by his wife, Ranjita Marndi, following his prior nomination from the Mayurbhanj Lok Sabha seat. Similarly, Archanarekha is the wife of incumbent Raghunathpali MLA Subrat Tarai.

Sarada Prasanna Jena, who contested unsuccessfully as an independent in the 2014 elections from Balikuda-Ersama, joined BJD in April 2019 after defecting from Congress. Biswaranjan Mallick switched from BJP to BJD in 2021 after losing to Sunanda Das by a narrow margin of 4,062 votes in the 2019 election. Mallick previously demonstrated his political prowess in the 2014 election by contesting against four-time MLA Debasis Nayak from Bari as an Independent candidate.

With these announcements, the regional party has finalized candidates for 141 of the 147 Assembly seats and all 21 Lok Sabha segments. The remaining six seats, including Khandapada, Begunia, Khurda, Bhograi, Nilagiri, and Korei, are yet to have their MLA candidates announced.

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