Lok Sabha 2019 constituency: Will BJD retain its hold over Odisha’s Dhenkanal?

Tathagata Satpathy of the Biju Janata Dal is the sitting member of Parliament from Odisha’s Dhenkanal, which has been under the state ruling party for the last three Lok Sabha terms.

Tathagata Satpathy was elected to Lok Sabha for the first time from Dhenkanal in 1998 but suffered a defeat in the 1999 general election at the hands of KP Singh Deo. A year later he quit the BJD to join Bijoy Mohapatra’s nascent Odisha Gana Parishad.

Tathagata Satpathy, the son of former Odisha chief minister Nandini Satpathy, quit the OGP to join the BJD a month before the 2004 Lok Sabha election. Since then he has never lost from Dhenkanal. The four-time BJD MP from Dhenkanal has announced he will quit politics.

Nabin Nanda, who had recently joined the Congress, will contest from Dhenkanal. The Bharatiya Janata Party has fielded Rudra Narayan Pany from the seat.

The Dhenkanal Lok Sabha seat will go to polls in the third phase of election on April 23. The votes will be counted on May 23.

READ: All about Lok Sabha elections 2019

Here are some details about the Dhenkanal Lok Sabha seat:

State: Odisha

Name of the Lok Sabha constituency: Dhenkanal

Polling date: April 23

2019 candidates: Nabin Nanda (Congress), Rudra Narayan Pany (BJP), Mahesh Sahu (BJD)

Sitting MP, party: Tathagata Satpathy, BJD

Winning margin in 2014: 137,340

Runner up name, party: Rudra Narayan Pany, BJP

Number of voters in 2014: 1,042,101

Percentage of votes polled in 2014: 76.43%

Number of women voters in 2014: 641,139

Number of polling booths in 2014: 1,610