Balangir:
As Odisha gets set to vote simultaneously for the Lok Sabha and Assembly elections, 14 members of erstwhile royal families are on the campaign trail, grinding it out in the heat and humidity.
(India Votes 2014: full coverage)Nowhere is this more pronounced than in Balangir in western Odisha where members of the same family are contesting against each other.
The sitting MP from Biju Janta Dal (BJD), Kalikesh Narayan Singh Deo, is a familiar face in television studios. His rival from the seat is his own sister-in-law, Sangeeta Singh Deo, a two-time MP of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) who hopes the Narendra Modi wave and her own experience in the constituency will mark her political return.
Kalikesh says people in the constituency have become accustomed to the political divide in the family. Being a royal and a politician, he says, has its ups and downs.
"It's a bit of both... it's an advantage because my family has been in politics for a long time. There is a history of serving people, so therefore a great deal of goodwill exists. The disadvantage is that the expectations are very high and one needs to work really hard," he said.
There is no love lost between the two sides and nowhere is the divide between the families more apparent than at the Sailashree palace at the centre of Balangir.
Locked in a battle for full ownership of the palace among other disputes, the two sides have split the property down the middle. Kalikesh's family lives on the left, while Sangeeta's stays on the right. All floors, including the grand durbar hall, are partitioned off. No one really seems to care much about maintaining the heritage property, the grounds of which are in very poor shape.
The two camps are led by family patriarchs, also in the election fray.
Kalikesh's father AU Singh Deo is a veteran politician and, at the last moment, was asked by Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, a close personal friend, to once again stand for the Balangir Assembly constituency in the face of tough opposition from senior Congress leader Narasingha Mishra.
AU Singh Deo had been expecting a Rajya Sabha nomination and his heir-apparent in the constituency was expected to be Arkesh, his youngest son. Arkesh will now have to wait to make his political debut.
On the other side of the Balangir palace, KV Singhdeo, or the Raja of Balangir as he is known, is the state BJP President. He fights the nearby Assembly seat of Patnagarh against Prakriti Devi Singh Deo, the wife of one of his brothers.
In this election season, it's all hands on deck for the erstwhile Royals here.
Everyone, including Kalikesh's mother and his wife Meghna Rana, a member of the Nepalese royal family, have been out campaigning.
Meghna, who has learnt to speak a bit of Odiya, also addresses people in his husband's constituency.
"We go to about 15 to 20 villages a day and there was this one village I went to where there was this really old lady who came upto me and took my hand, and she blessed me and said the reason was that she used to earlier walk for 2 kms to get water. And now, your husband has gotten us water supply and we don't need to take that 2-kms trek. And she blessed me and I felt really proud of my husband," she said.
Meghna's mother-in-law, who has seen her husband AU Singh Deo through several assembly elections, has been campaigning with her.
"She has taken to it like a fish to water. Yes, she gives speeches, tiny ones. But she does. I am there. That's support for her and she is keen to be a support for her husband and the family," said Vijaylakshmi Singh Deo.
11 candidates of the BJD are contesting in either the Assembly or Lok Sabha elections which are being held simultaneously in two phases. Three candidates of the BJP are also royals. Members of royal families are contesting from Balangir, Kalahandi and Kandhamal Lok Sabha seats in addition to several assembly seats.
The stakes for all members of erstwhile royal families in Odisha are huge. They may have an emotional and historic connect with voters in their constituency but the bottom line to their success as politicians will lie in what they deliver on the ground -
bijli, sadak, paani. And, in these parts, employment for the thousands who migrate to other states in search of jobs.
Odisha votes for Lok Sabha and Assembly elections in two phases - April 10 and 17.
(See poll schedule)