The ticket distribution for the Lok Sabha election has deepened the factional feud within the Congress in Haryana, with senior party leaders openly airing their displeasure in almost half of the nine constituencies being contested by the party.
The Congress is contesting from nine of the State’s 10 Lok Sabha seats this election, while one seat – Kurukshetra – has been given to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)’s Sushil Gupta as part of its seat-sharing agreement. Polling for all seats will be held on May 25.
While the party was hoping to cash in on the farmers’ resentment and high unemployment rate in the State besides the anti-incumbency sentiment against the 10-year rule of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) both in the State and at the Centre, Congress leaders in the race for tickets in Hisar, Gurgaon, Bhiwani-Mahendragarh and Faridabad are now blaming the denial of tickets to them on “internal politics”.
Former Hisar Lok Sabha MP Brijendra Singh, who had quit the BJP to join the Congress in March, and Haryana Pradesh Congress Committee working president Shruti Choudhry were the two notable omissions in the first list of eight candidates announced by the party on April 25, which was four days before the nomination process for the Lok Sabha poll in Haryana kicked off.
Both leaders are considered rivals of the Bhupinder Singh Hooda camp and close to former Union Minister Kumari Selja and Rajya Sabha MP Randeep Surjewala, who represent another faction in the State politics.
The two held meetings with their supporters soon after the announcement of the tickets and did not mince words to express their disappointment. They, however, said that they would abide by the decision of the party’s central leadership.
At a press conference in Jind on April 28, Mr. Brijendra, son of former Union Minister Chaudhary Birender Singh, said he was expecting to get the ticket being the “sitting Lok Sabha MP” (until he had resigned in March), but lost it due to State’s “internal politics”.
While Mr. Brijendra was seeking a ticket from Hisar, Ms. Choudhry, a former MP and the granddaughter of former Chief Minister Bansi Lal, had staked claim to her family’s traditional seat of Bhiwani-Mahendragarh. Instead, three-time Hisar Lok Sabha MP Jai Prakash and Mahendragarh MLA Rao Dan Singh, both considered to be Mr. Hooda’s loyalists, were nominated for Hisar and Bhiwani-Mahendragarh seats, respectively.
Gurgaon nomination
Similarly, the nomination of actor-turned-politician Raj Babbar from the Gurgaon Lok Sabha constituency did not go down well with All India Congress Committee OBC cell chairman and six-time MLA Capt. Ajay Yadav, who took to “X” to say that “there is a deep-rooted conspiracy of a few Congress Haryana State leaders to crush the senior leaders”. Capt. Yadav, who also does not get along with Mr. Hooda, stayed away from a rally in Gurugram held on Friday after Mr. Babbar filed his nomination.
Capt. Yadav had lost to BJP’s Rao Inderjit Singh by over three lakh votes in the 2019 Lok Sabha election.
Except Sirsa, where the Congress has fielded Ms. Selja, most of the candidates are seen as Hooda loyalists.
Five-time MLA Karan Dalal, who lost the race to the Faridabad Lok Sabha ticket to two-time State Cabinet Minister Mahendra Pratap Singh, held a mahapanchayat in Palwal and gave the party central leadership time till Sunday to review its decision. He later issued a statement saying that he would adhere to the party’s decision, but added that he was still upset.
“I had been actively raising people’s issues for the past five years and was the frontrunner for the Faridabad seat in the party’s internal survey. It would have made more sense to field a Jat over a Gurjar since the seat has been previously held by a Jat leader thrice,” Mr. Dalal told The Hindu.
He also questioned the rationale behind fielding party’s Haryana Youth Congress president Divyanshu Budhi Raja from Karnal Lok Sabha, saying that he was a novice compared to his opponent, former Chief Minister Manohar Lal of the BJP’s.
AICC Haryana in-charge Deepak Babaria refused to comment on whether the resentment among party leaders could impact its electoral prospects in the State, but said those having reservations must speak to the party’s top leadership and not express their views publicly.
