Kalahandi Lok Sabha Constituency

Kalahandi Lok Sabha Constituency, is one of 21 Lok Sabha constituencies in the eastern state of Odisha and will cast its vote in the 2019 election on April 11.

Kalahandi Lok Sabha constituency covers seven assembly segments –  Nuapada, Khariar, Lanjigarh, Junagarh, Dharmgarh, Bhawanipatna and Narla. While Lanjigarh assembly segment is reserved for members of Scheduled Tribe, Bhawanipatna is reserved for members for Scheduled Caste.

In the 2014 Lok Sabha election, Arka Keshari Deo of the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) – won with a  margin of over 56 thousand votes. He had defeated Pradeep Kumar Naik of the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Arka joined BJD in 2013 after his father Bikram Keshari Deo, who was a BJP MP from Kalahandi, died.

The voter turnout figure was at 75.83 percent across 1892 polling stations. Some of the other candidates in the fray were Bhakta Charan Das from  Indian National Congress (INC) and Siba Hati from Samajwadi Party (SP).

In the year 2009, Bhakta Charan Das of the INC managed to secure his winning position by getting 1.5 lakh votes against BJD'S Subhas Chandra Behera.

The voter turnout across 1732 polling stations for this election here was 68.85 percent. Some of the other candidates in the fray were BSP's Nakula Majhi and BJP's Bikram Keshari.