Paika Marks A New March

The country’s east is BJP’s next terrain for political expansion. In Orissa, the first move is proving smart.

 

- Bhavna Vij-Aurora

When finance minister Arun Jaitley announced in his budget speech this year a commemoration of 200 years of Paika rebellion, not many outside Orissa would have heard about it before. Among the first armed uprisings against the British east India Company, it never found its place in history books where 1857 is the officially recognised as the first war of independence.

“Two hundred years ago, in 1817, a valiant uprising of soldiers led by Buxi Jagabandhu (Bidyadhar Mohapatra) took place in Khurda. We will commemorate the same appropriately,” Jaitley had said. Recognition of the Paika rebellion at the national level brought much cheer to Orissa —and was welcomed even by chief minister Naveen Patnaik.

Less than two months later, Prime Minister Narendra Modi felicitated at Bhubaneswar’s Raj Bhavan descendants of 16 families associated with the rebellion. He was in Orissa to attend the Bharatiya Janata Party’s April 15-16 national executive. The venue was strategically chosen: the party is making a big push to mop up the unconquered parts of eastern India. Orissa, West Bengal, Tripura and the remaining states of the Northeast still form territory where the BJP is yet to create a firm imprint.

Among those honoured by Modi was Upasana Mohapatra, daughter of late Congress leader Lalatendu (Lulu) Bidyadhar Mohapatra, a descendant of Buxi Jagabandhu. Lulu’s elder brother Lalitendu was also present at the function. Both Upasana and Lalitendu had earlier announced their intention of joining politics, and the buzz in Bhubaneswar is that the BJP would be their natural destination.