Odisha’s hollow democracy: Three decades without real opposition

By Bhabani Shankar Nayak 

For over three decades, Odisha has lived under the illusion of electoral democracy—one where opposition politics exists in name but not in function. In a healthy democracy, opposition parties serve as watchdogs, challengers, and visionaries. They scrutinise laws, hold governments accountable, and offer alternative paths to progress. But in Odisha, this vital democratic pillar has eroded, leaving behind a political landscape marked by complacency, collaboration, and creeping authoritarianism.

The death of Biju Patnaik marked a turning point in Odisha’s political history. His legacy was repackaged into the Biju Janata Dal (BJD), which rose to power in 2000, ending the Congress Party’s era of misgovernance. For twenty-four years, the BJD ruled with minimal resistance. Opposition parties, including the BJP, failed to mount meaningful challenges and often collaborated with the ruling party. This political inertia persisted until June 2024, when the BJP seized power—less through visionary leadership and more through strategic propaganda and the invocation of Odia Asmita.

The BJP’s victory in the 2024 state elections was not a triumph of ideas but a consequence of BJD’s internal failures. Yet, since assuming power, the BJP has largely continued the BJD’s policies, diluting welfare measures and failing to address the deep-rooted issues of economic and social marginalisation. Within two years, the BJP government has become synonymous with ineffectiveness, rising crime, and administrative decay.

What’s most alarming is the BJD’s failure to act as a robust opposition. Instead of harnessing public discontent, it has chosen silence—perhaps repaying the BJP for years of political cooperation. This tacit collaboration between ruling and opposition parties has left Odisha’s working masses politically orphaned. The absence of genuine opposition has created fertile ground for authoritarianism, where governance is reduced to spectacle and dissent is muted.

Authoritarianism doesn’t arrive with a bang; it creeps in through silence, inefficiency, and the erosion of democratic checks. Odisha’s current political climate—marked by ineffective governance and opposition complicity—is a textbook case of democratic decay. Constructive opposition cannot coexist with authoritarian tendencies. Accommodation only enables them.

Some argue that Odisha’s electorate quietly corrects course through the ballot box. But this passive approach consumes time and resources that could be used for development. In politics, silence is complicity. Odisha cannot afford to wait for the next election cycle to correct its course. The time for decisive action is now.

Odisha’s future depends on breaking free from the stagnant binary of ruling and non-ruling elites. The state needs a radical politics rooted in Dr. B.R. Ambedkar’s call to “educate, agitate, and organise.” This means mobilising resources, redistributing wealth, and dismantling entrenched hierarchies of caste, class, and gender. Only a decentralised, democratic framework can empower the people and place Odisha on a path of inclusive development.

The last twenty-six years of governance—whether under Congress, BJD, or BJP—have been marked by over-promising and under-delivering. Odisha’s people must now reflect, analyse, and act. The state needs a new political imagination—one that prioritises the needs and aspirations of its people over the interests of entrenched elites. Democracy is not just about elections; it’s about transformation. Odisha must reclaim it.