Ex-Union minister Srikant Jena rejoins Congress, vows to defeat BJD-BJP

By  Sudam Patra

Bhubaneswar, March 7: Veteran politician and former Union minister Srikant Jena staged a comeback to the Congress on Tuesday. He rejoined the Congress at a function held at the Congress Bhawan in New Delhi in the presence of the party’s Odisha in-charge, Ajoy Kumar.

 Later, Jena met party president Mallikarjuna Kharge.

Jena was expelled from the party after making “anti-party” remarks about five years ago. He had questioned the leadership of Niranjan Patnaik who was the then Odisha Congress president.

However, his homecoming, and that too ahead of the upcoming elections has come as a shot in the arm of the grand old party which has been out of power in Odisha for 25 years.

Many Congress leaders who had stayed away from the party have been ushered into the party fold in the last few weeks. 

After joining the Congress, Jena told the media, “The Prime Minister went to Odisha on Tuesday and Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik was there. Both the BJP and the BJD are getting united in an open alliance. From the beginning, they were in an open alliance. Now again, they are joining hands together. I am sure Congress and the INDIA bloc will fight and defeat them.”