The controversial conversation has come to the fore after its audio CD was circulated among a section of the local media in the state capital Bhubaneswar. It is not yet known who is behind the circulation of the CD.
The development, however, has left the BJD, particularly its president and chief minister Naveen Patnaik red faced because, just a few days ago, Patnaik had charged the opposition Congress of maintaining a double standard on the Posco front.
“While the Congress-led UPA government at the Centre has extended its full support to implementing the prestigious steel project, the party’s state unit has joined hands with the anti-Posco groups”, Patnaik had maintained soon after the recent violence at the Posco site which had left a local villager dead and several other injured.
In the taped conversation, the BJD MLA Debasish Samantaray was reportedly discussing the recent violence at the Posco site as well as other related issues with Narayan Reddy, a former CPI MLA who is currently leading the PPSS’s agitation in Jagatsinghpur in absence of organization’s president, Abhay Sahu, currently in judicial custody.
Opposition parties like the Congress and the BJP have already demanded an inquiry into the taped conversation.
Interestingly, neither Samantaray nor Reddy has denied the conversation. While the BJD MLA said that he had not done anything wrong by speaking to the latter, as his party and the left parties had jointly fought the last Lok Sabha and assembly elections, the senior CPI leader has maintained that it was wrong and illegal to tape the private telephonic conversation of an individual.
It is important to note that the CPI Lok Sabha member from Jagatsinghpur, Bibhu Prasad Tarai who has extended its full support to the anti-Posco agitation was elected with the backing of the BJD.
The development has led the state industries circles to question the sincerity of both the BJD government in the state and the UPA government at the centre to implement big ticket projects in Odisha, especially the Rs 52,000 crore Posco project, the biggest foreign direct investment (FDI) in the country.
“The recent developments have proved that both the BJD and the Congress are playing a double game. I see a bleak future for the Posco project”, said a highly placed source at the Odisha Chamber of Commerce and Industries who did not want to be quoted.
