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Patnaik smiles as BJP rifts from BJD

Bibhuti Mishra in Bhubaneswar

No doubt, Janaki Ballabh Patnaik is a happy man today.

The rift between the Biju Janata Dal and the Bharatiya Janata Party -- the partners that defeated Congress in the Lok Sabha polls of 98 and 99, and are poised to hand the ruling party a comprehensive defeat in the forthcoming assembly election this February - is, for him, heaven-sent.

The BJD and BJP have fallen out over seat sharing and the issue of who'll ascend the chief minister's chair. The BJP strongly resents the projection of BJD president Naveen Patnaik as the next in power.

"I am not aware of any such projection," claims BJP vice president Prashanta Nanda.

Many BJP leaders say the CM should come from the party that gets more seats. Hence the significance of having more constituencies to contest. And that's the snag.

While the BJP demands at least half of the total 147 seats, the BJD is not willing to concede more than 60. The BJP claims its survey shows that the party stands a very good chance of winning more than 85 seats, and that this alone should be the criterion for seat sharing.

The BJD however is in no mood to listen. A compromise formula that envisages all sitting legislators (37 of BJD and 10 of BJP), and the rest of the 100 seats to be equally divided, also does not suit the BJP.

Besides this, the alliance may have to contend with a large number of rebels. Realising that it is now within striking distance of power, many aspirants have popped up -- each seat has at least 10 such.

Thus, the stage is set for many rebels to file papers even if the seat adjustment snag between the partners is sorted out. In the last Lok Sabha poll, the presence of a BJP rebel in Dhenkanal caused the alliance candidate to lose to the Congress.

And it is precisely this kind of situation that Patnaik, as the Orissa Pradesh Congress Committee president, is looking for.

A past master at exploiting rifts, he has, when the occasion demanded, created a quite a few himself. The last two Rajya Sabha elections are cases in point: he sent Congress candidates to Delhi solely on the merit of cross-votes that arouse thanks to cracks in the opposing alliance.

The cracks, of course, were helped along by Patnaik.

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