Bhubaneswar, March 2 -- With the 2024 Lok Sabha and Odisha Assembly elections approaching fast, the political atmosphere in Dasapalla has already started to heat up.

Dasapalla is an Assembly constituency of Nayagarh district and one of the seven Assembly segments under the Kandhamal Parliamentary seat. Once regarded as a fortress of the Congress, Dasapalla has been in the thrall of the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) since 2009.

Incumbent MLA Ramesh Chandra Behera is one among the many aspirants who wish to contest the elections on a BJD ticket. Behera has strong reasons to aspire for a ticket. In the 2019 elections, he defeated Purna Chandra Nayak, fielded by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), by a margin of over 35,000 votes and, at the same tim...