Subhechcha Ganguly 
On Saturday, the Congress and the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) released their respective lists of top candidates for the Dhamnagar by-election.
There are 40 people on the BJD’s roster of prominent campaigners, excluding politician-turned-actor Anubhav Mohanty and Minister Samir Dash.
Star campaigners for the conch party include Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, Pranab Prakash Das, Prasanna Acharya, Debi Prasad Mishra, Ranendra Pratap Swain, Prafulla Samal, Pramila Mallik, Pratap Keshari Deb, Atanu Sabyasachi Nayak, Ashok Chandra Panda, Amar Prasad Satpathy, Arun Kumar Sahoo, Pritiranjan Gharai.
Additionally, the Congress has made public their list of 30 top candidates for the Dhamnagar byelection. Md. Moquim, a legislator from Barabati-Cuttack, is not listed on the list, though.
The grand old party’s leading campaigners for the byelection include A Chella Kumar, who is in charge of the AICC in Odisha, G Rudra Rju, the AICC secretary, Sarat Patnaik, the president of the OPCC, Narasingha MIshra, Niranjan Patnaik, Jayadev Jena, Prasad Harichandan, Chiranjib Biswal, Bhakta Charan Das.
On Friday, the Bharatiya Janata Party unveiled a list of its top candidates. Samir Mohanty, the state in-charge for the party, three Union Ministers, Aparajita Sarangi, the MP for Bhubaneswar, Baijayant Panda, and Sambit Patra are among the 40 individuals listed as the party’s leading campaigners.
Son of the late Bishnu Sethi, Suryavanshi Suraj, has been nominated by the BJP for the byelection. Abanti Das and Baba Harekrushna Sethi, respectively, are the candidates chosen by the BJD and Congress. Rajendra Das, the leader of the BJD’s “rebellion,” is running as an independent.
