Odisha CM Majhi lodges himself firmly in saddle

"'M simple, but I'm not feeble," asserts Odisha chief minister Mohan Majhi. That is what he proved early this month. Majhi, who has been taken as a malleable chief minister, showed his grit when it comes to take a difficult decision.

- DILIP KUMAR BISOI

In the first week of July, an administrative paralysis gripped the State when the Odisha Administrative Offciers' Association called for a lightening stop work strike protesting the brutal attack on a senior OAS officer by BJP workers instigated by a senior leader of the party. The Statewide cease work strike by the OAS officers could not have come at a worse time. The Rath Yatra at Puri and other places were yet to be completed and the flash food was inundating several parts of the State. The OAS Officers' Association, not contended with the arrest of five of BJP workers and their suspension from the party, was insisting on the arrest of the BJP senior leader Jaganath Pradhan, who was according to it is the mastermind of the attack. Pradhan, who had unsuccessfully contested the last assembly election from the prestigious Bhubaneswar (Middle) constituency, however, was backed by BJP heavyweights.

The chief minister Majhi was in a Catch-22 situation. The entire State was, in fact, watching him and his move in this situation.

Majhi, a tribal leader who has crawled up to the top seat from the level of a Sarpach, exhibited his strong commitment to governance. He packed off the senior leader, Jagannath Pradhan, along with his five supporters to jail, thus resolving the stalemate.