BJP confident of winning Odisha's Patkura assembly seat

Bijaya Mohapatra, the BJP candidate from Odisha's Patkura assembly seat, cast his vote as polling got underway on Saturday after being postponed twice in the past few months.

"The election procedure is going peaceful so far except in some places where the BJD goons are creating a ruckus and made a joke of the election machinery. I have voted now and I am very confident that BJP will win," Mohapatra told ANI.

Mohapatra, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik's bete noire, is contesting against BJD's Sabitri Agarwal, wife of former Patkura MLA Bed Prakash Agarwal, whose death in April led to the postponement of polling. The voting was again postponed Cyclone Fani hit Odisha in early May.

Mohapatra was earlier a four-time BJD legislator and was expelled from the party by Patnaik ahead of 2000 assembly elections. He has, since then, not been able to make it to the state assembly.

Voting has been peaceful with no untoward incident in the constituency in coastal Kendrapara district.

"People are coming in good numbers to vote today and I am very happy that people are taking off from their services and taking out time to vote. The process is going on very peacefully and around 90 per cent I think votes will be recorded from Patkura," a voter told ANI.

Nearly 2,45,000 voters are eligible to exercise their franchise.