Dear readers,
Theodore Roosevelt once said that the vote is like a rifle and its usefulness depends upon the character of the user. As election fever grips Haryana, one wonders if the Jatland will take Roosevelt’s words seriously or if the political potboiler is gearing up for something more disruptive.
The BJP has issued the first and second lists of candidates for the Haryana Assembly election and it has already created much heartburn, with several sitting MLAs having been denied tickets that in in turn has led to a spate of resignations.
Playing safe, the Congress has repeated most of its MLAs, but it is still to declare candidates for more than half the seats. Using the Olympian wrestler Vinesh Phogat to contest as a Congress candidate from Julana and the wrestler Bajrang Punia joining the party as an office bearer could come as a shot in the arm for the grand old party in a State where sportspersons enjoy a sort of celebrity status.
But the BJP has its own share of sportspersons. Wrestler Babita Phogat, who has been in the BJP since 2019, accused Congress leader Bhupinder Singh Hooda of creating a rift in the family by making her cousin Vinesh join the Congress. She said that Vinesh should have listened to Mahavir Phogat (Babita’s father and Vinesh’s uncle) instead.
Mahavir Phogat, whose character was played by Aamir Khan in the 2016 Bollywood sports biopic Dangal, also recently expressed annoyance that his niece Vinesh and son-in-law Bajrang (married to his youngest daughter Sangeeta Phogat) had joined the Congress.
Besides the wrestlers, this Haryana election will offer many firsts. It is possibly the first time that Haryana, which is usually a direct contest between the Congress and the BJP, will see a five-cornered fight. And in many of the new alliances that have come up, the dals (parties) have come together but not their dil (heart). The State is seeing a baffling mix of ideas and ideologies it remains to be seen what the churning will yield.
Another first is that Chandrashekhar Azad’s Aazad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram) and Dushyant Chautala’s party Jannayak Janta Party have tied up to test the waters in Haryana. After the split verdict of the 2019 Assembly polls, Dushyant was the kingmaker and joined hands with the BJP. He served as Deputy Chief Minister in the Manohar Lal Khattar government until the BJP suddenly snapped ties in March this year. Dushyant has obviously reacted, changing colour from saffron (BJP) to blue (ASP).
Mayawati’s Bahujan Samaj Party and Om Prakash Chautala’s INLD (led by his son Abhay Chautala) have tied up for this election. Their alliance in 2019 was called off before the election took place. They did contest the 1998 Lok Sabha election together, winning five of the State’s 10 seats, but that was when both party founders, Kanshi Ram and Devi Lal, were alive and enjoyed a warm equation. Today, 26 years later, as the next generation comes together for the first time, it could be a very different scenario.
The Congress too is battling inner-party rivalry. The tiffs that began between former Congress State chief Ashok Tanwar, a Dalit (handpicked by Rahul Gandhi), and the party’s most popular Jat leader Bhupinder Singh Hooda (two-term Chief Minister) led to Tanwar’s exit ahead of the 2019 Assembly election. Hooda’s equation with former State chief Kumari Selja, who is the party’s most prominent Dalit face now, is also strained. Kumari Selja’s supporters are, in fact, making a strong pitch to declare her the chief ministerial face. An otherwise reticent Selja’s remark that “there is nothing wrong in desiring to become Chief Minister, although the final decision rests with the high command” has led to tongues wagging.
Allowing the veteran Hooda to run the show in Haryana again shows that the Congress central leadership’s hands are tied. Hooda had asserted similar control in 2019 and 2024, despite the leadership’s willingness to try someone new. While he claims this will be his last election, observers are taking it with a pinch of salt.
Meanwhile, the BJP is continuing with its non-Jat, OBC Chief Minister experiment, given that 40 per cent of the population is OBC.
Haryana goes to the polls on October 5 and all the politicians know that if they have to get votes here, they have to capture the imagination of the rural voter as well, notwithstanding the skyscrapers that dot the skyline in Gurugram. Perhaps the AAP’s Rajya Sabha MP Raghav Chadha knows this well. Asking voters to give change a chance and vote for AAP, he referred to the popular Radio Mirchi, saying “Wo kahte hain na ki Mirchi sunne waale always khush, to hum kahte hain ki Arvind Kejriwal ko chunne waale always khush” (They say that those who listen to Radio Mirchi are always happy, we say those who elect Arvind Kerjiwal’s party are always happy).
Upping the BJP’s double-engine sarkar pitch, Chadha said that since Haryana has Delhi on one end and Punjab at the other, both ruled by the AAP, if the party is voted in Haryana, it will usher in a “triple engine” sarkar.
What the voters think of all this will be out on October 8 when the results are declared. Until then, write to us with your comments on Haryana, Hooda, and all the pre-election hoopla.
Anand Mishra | Political Editor, Frontline
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