The Bharatiya Jana Sangh came in to existence in 1951. By the time it had no unit in Orissa. Its foundation was established in Orissa in 1964 with the visit of Pandit Dindayal Upadhyay, the National President of the party. On this occasion, in a public meeting at Jharsuguda, he assigned organisational functions to Hon'ble Kushabhau Thakre and Hon'ble Sridhar Acharya . Thus Thakreji and Acharyaji took the charge of Observer and Organisation Secretary respectively for the state of Orissa. Thakreji with other leaders promisingly started organisational work from Western Orissa. Thus during 1971 Jana Sangha had already started its work at Jharsuguda, Sambalpur, Balasore, and Cuttack and in the same year it took part in the election in Lamp (Deepa) Symbol.

In 1975 ‘Emergency' was promulgated in the country and the leaders of opposition parties were arrested and sent to prison. Prime Minister Smt. Indira Gandhi continued her reign of terror in the plea of maintenance of law and order. During this time Bharatiya Jana Sangha tried too much for reinstating democracy in the country and fought against the dictatorship of Smt. Gandhi . In the post-emergency election to Orissa Legislative Assembly four Bharatiya Jana Sangha leader were elected. They were Sri Biswa Bhusan Harichandan, Sri Bimbadhar Kuanr , Sri Purusottam Nayak and Sri Khirod Chandra Swain from Chilika, Bhatli Bangiriposhi and Ramcandrapur constituencies respectively . The then Government could not complete the full tenure due to the question of dual membership.

Bharatiya Janata Party was formed in 1980. The ‘ Prantiya Adhivesana ' ( State Level Meeting ) of Orissa was held at Rourkela in 1981. Here Hon'ble Atal Bihari Vajpayee , the founder and first National President of the party provided ‘ Marga Darshana ' from this day. Sri Atal Bihari Vajpayee and other senior leaders of the party continued their visit to state. The National Executive Meeting of BJP was held in Orissa in 1982. The then Chief Minister of Orissa Sri Janaki Ballava Pattnaik took the stewardship of Congress to make the meeting a failure. Often the Government of Orissa did not provide Hon'ble Vajpayee, a room in State Guest House . Even the Government attempted for the last minute closure of this huge public meeting which was scheduled to be held in the parade ground ( now Indira Gandhi Park)

1982 another BJP Executive Committee Meeting was held in Kasturba Nari Mahal at Bhubaneswar. In 1984 Sri Atal Bihari Vajpayee visited many parts of Orissa . Other founder leader Sri Lal Krishna Advani also visited Orissa again and again . In 1985 Orissa State Legislative Assembly election, BJP succeeded in only one constituency i.e. Kamaksa Nagar. In 1989 Lok Sabha election BJP contested in six seats and got 1.5 percent votes. In 1990, in an election to Orissa Legislative Assembly BJP raised the percentage of Vote to 3.56 %. It also achieved success in two assembly seats, with the victory of Sri Bikram Kesari Deo from Junagarh and Sri Jual Oram from Bonei.

Then in 1991 Lok Sabha election BJP had to take a decisive role in political arena when Janata Dal was reduced from 16 to 6 out of 21 seats. Here it is noteworthy that the fall of Janata Dal vote was the result of the advancement of BJP with 9.50 percent of votes.

In 1992, in a by-election to the Orissa Legislative Assembly for Malkangiri held subsequent to the death of Janata Dal MLA Naka Kanaya, the young BJP Leader Sri Arabinda Dhali became victorious in a prestigious triangular contest which kicked off the rise of BJP in every nook and corner of remote parts of Orissa.

In the month of November-1992 BJP National Executive met again at Bhubaneswar where all the senior leaders of the party including the Chief Ministers of four States under BJP rule , viz-Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh participated. In a massive public meeting in the Capital High School playground at Bhubaneswar, a large numbers of ground level worker of the party participated which enabled BJP to create a wave in Orissa.

In 1995 the numbers of MLA of Bhartiya Janata Party in the Orissa Legislative Assembly reached to 9 with the election of following leaders: Sl. Name Constituency

1. Sri Samir Dey ................................... Cuttack City
2. Sri Mahesh Sahoo............................... Talcher
3. Sri Anant Narayan Singh Deo........... Sorada
4. Sri Bikram Kesari Deo......................... Junagarh
5. Sri Jual Oram...................................... Bonei
6. Sri Pradipta Kumar Nayak.................... Bhawanipatna.
7. Sri Jogendra Nayak.............................. Keonjhar.
8. Sri Arabinda Dhali................................ Malkangiri
9. Sri Kanak Vardhan Sing Deo.................. Patnagarh.

BJP managed to get more than one lakh votes in 10 th Lok Sabha Election in 1996, though none of its candidate won the election . In the by-election for the Bhubaneswar Assembly Constituency BJP won prestigiously with Sri Biswa Bhusan Harichandan as it's candidate. This victory was note worthy as from here only veteran Janata Dal leader Sri Biju Pattnaik had been elected in the past . So the victory of Sri Harichandan took the number of BJP MLA into two digit i.e. 10. Since then Bhubaneswar is still continuing as a strong hold of Bharatiya Janata Party.

After raising its legislative position into two digit BJP seriously thought not to divide non-Congress votes. Thus came the division of Janata Dal owing to it's alliance with BJP to fight unitedly in the election. The break away group formed a regional political party named Biju Janata Dal headed by Sri Naveen Pattnaik. Both the BJP and BJD contested unitedly in 1998 Lok Sabha election and secured 16 seats out of 21. BJP contested 9 seats and owned 7 seats . For the first time BJP became able to sail the ship of election with tremendous success. Senior BJP leader Sri Debendra Pradhan was included in the Union Council of Ministers as Minister of Surface Transport. He transformed the National Highway map of Orissa into great a success.
He joined 1600 Kilo metre more in the existing map since independence. He also opened Krishi Vignana Kendra throughout Orissa when he assumed the portfolio of Agriculture in the Union Council of Ministers.

Congress party imposed a large burden of 8000 Crores rupees over the people of India by the immoral voting of Sri Giridhar Gamang , MP who was also the Chief Minister of Orissa which ousted the Government of Sri Atal Behari Vajpayee at the centre.

The in the General election to the Lok Sabha in 1999, BJP got all the 9 seats in Orissa with 100% success increasing it's percentage of vote from 21.19 to 24.63%. The immoral deeds of Giridhar Gamango boomeranged for Congress. This party had to pay the price for the hated political behaviour in Lok Sabha, BJP took away the Congress strong hold of Nawarangpur and Berhampur from which Congress had not been defeated so far since independence. Sri PV Narsimha Rao contested election to Lok Sabha from Berhampur constituency only for reasons of victory from Congress stronghold. But BJP brought the traditional Congress seats of Berhampur and Nawarangpur into its own hand in this election. It was also a big blow to the family politics of Sri Janaki Ballava Pattnaik in the state of Orissa as his wife Smt. Jayanti Pattnaik got defeated from Sri Anadi Sahu, the candidate of Bharatiya Janata party. During this 12 th Loksabha the BJP MP Sri Jual Oram was conferred with the Cabinet portfolio of Tribal Affairs. Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee gave him this assignment creating a new ministry, for the first time in the history of Independent India. During his tenure 270 communities were included in the list of Scheduled Tribes by amending the constitution of India (The Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Amendment) Act, 2002).

In 2000, the alliance of BJP and BJD secured 114 seats out of 147 constituencies of Orissa Legislative Assembly and formed the government under the Chief Ministership of Sri Naveen Pattnaik in which 9 BJP legislators became Ministers. BJP owned 38 seats out of 63 it contested and 4 nos of independent legislators supported to BJP.

In 2002, State 3-Tier Panchayat Election BJP could raise its positions from 120 Zilla Parishad Members to 183 Z.P. Members out of 854 seats. In this election BJP had 7 Zilla Parishad Presidents, which was 5 more than the result of 1997 and 8 Zilla Parishad Vice Presidents. Out of 314 Blocks BJP set-up his position in 73 Blocks Chairmen and 68 Vice Chairmen. In 1997 Urban body election it had 218 word councilors to its credit which rose to 331 in 2003. In this election BJP captured 23 Chairmen of Urban Body inplace of 8 Chairmen and 12 Vice Chairman in 1997. In the first ever Corporation Election to the twin corporate bodies of Bhubaneswar and Cuttack BJP succeeded in securing the prestigious posts of Mayor in CMC and Dy. Mayor in BMC.