Criticism of Pandian unfortunate, says Naveen

Bhubaneswar: The BJD supremo, Naveen Patnaik, on Saturday said that criticism of his aide V K Pandian for the party’s defeat in the Odisha Assembly elections was unfortunate as he did an “excellent job”.

The five-term chief minister, however, in the same breath, reiterated that Pandian, a bureaucrat-turned-politician hailing from Tamil Nadu, was not his successor and asserted that the people of Odisha would decide who his successor would be.

Naveen said he gracefully accepted defeat in the recently concluded Assembly elections and would continue to serve the people of the State in whichever way possible.

“As an officer, he (Pandian) did an excellent job in different fields in the last 10 years, be it during two cyclones or the COVID-19 pandemic. After this good work, he retired from the bureaucracy and joined the BJD and contributed largely by doing an excellent work,” Naveen said.