Odisha’s Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik implored the BJP on Monday to elevate Lord Jagannath above political machinations, following the uproar caused by the party’s Puri candidate, Sambit Patra. Patra had provocatively stated that the state’s most venerated deity is a “devotee of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.”
Subsequently, Patra clarified that his remark was a verbal misstep, intending instead to convey that the Prime Minister is an ardent ‘bhakt’ (devotee) of Lord Jagannath, not the reverse. In a post on X, Patnaik excoriated Patra for wounding Odia ‘asmita’ (pride).
“Mahaprabhu Shree Jagannatha, the sovereign of the cosmos, should never be depicted as a ‘bhakt’ of any mortal being. Such an assertion is an affront to the Lord, wholly reprehensible. It has affronted the sentiments and degraded the faith of countless Jagannatha devotees and Odias globally.
“The Lord epitomizes Odia asmita. I vehemently repudiate this statement… and I beseech the BJP to refrain from entangling the Lord in political dialogues. This transgression has profoundly bruised Odia pride and will be long remembered and condemned by the people of Odisha,” he declared.
Responding to the Chief Minister’s post, Patra mentioned that “everyone experiences slips of the tongue.” “After the colossal success of Shri Narendra Modiji’s road show in Puri today, I provided numerous sound bites to various media outlets, consistently highlighting that Modi ji is a fervent ‘bhakt’ of Shri Jagannath Mahaprabhu. By mistake, during one of these interactions, I misspoke… I believe you understand this… Sir, let’s not fabricate an issue from a non-issue… we all have slips of the tongue occasionally,” Patra explained. Delhi’s Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal also denounced the BJP candidate’s remark, stating, “I unequivocally condemn this statement from the BJP. They have begun to perceive themselves as superior to the divine. This represents the zenith of hubris. Declaring God a devotee of Modi ji is an insult to the divine,” he shared on X.
AICC’s Odisha in-charge, Ajoy Kumar, also censured the statement, posting on X, “The nation and Odisha will not tolerate this affront to Lord Jagannath!”
Concurrently, the Odisha Pradesh Congress Committee (OPCC) petitioned the state Chief Electoral Officer (CEO), accusing Patra of violating the model code of conduct. The party’s Puri candidate, Jayanarayan Patnaik, also lodged a complaint against Patra at the Town police station in Puri.
The OPCC’s petition to the CEO claimed that Patra’s statement constitutes an “offensive act designed to insult the religious convictions of Lord Jagannath’s devotees specifically, and the Hindu community and Odia people broadly, uttered with deliberate and malicious intent to outrage the religious sentiments of millions of Lord Jagannath devotees.”
The Trinamool Congress asserted that Patra’s “blasphemous” statement had aggrieved millions nationwide. West Bengal minister and senior party leader Chandrima Bhattacharya, in a Bengali video message, stated, “Sambit Patra has surpassed all bounds of arrogance and audacity. Merely saying he hurt the sentiments of myriad devotees of the Lord is an understatement. He has committed an act of blasphemy, demonstrating the BJP’s scant respect for our deities. He has ridiculed the faith and beliefs of Hindus. Such an utterance is unimaginable.”
She added that the countless devotees visiting the renowned Jagannath temple in Puri annually from West Bengal would not accept Patra’s “post-protest apology.” “The people of Odisha and Bengal will reprimand him and his party BJP for such a sacrilegious remark,” she proclaimed.
The TMC, via its official X handle, declared, “BJP’s Puri candidate Sambit Patra reached a new nadir by asserting that even Lord Jagannath is a devotee of PM Modi. By dragging Mahaprabhu’s name into their trivial political rhetoric to bolster the Prime Minister’s image, the BJP has injured the sentiments of crores of devotees not just in Bengal but worldwide.”
The BJD president’s critique of the BJP occurred against the backdrop of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah spotlighting the issue of Lord Jagannath’s Ratna Bhandar (treasury) in election rallies.
In his addresses at election rallies in Angul and Cuttack on Monday, Modi highlighted the missing Ratna Bhandar key issue, questioning why the BJD “suppressed the judicial commission report” on the matter. “The BJD’s involvement in the case is dubious. After the BJP assumes governance in Odisha, it will disclose the report,” Modi asserted.
Patra is contesting the Puri parliamentary constituency for the second consecutive time, having been narrowly defeated in 2019 by BJD’s Pinaki Mishra by a margin of merely 11,784 votes.