Despite their serious efforts to put up an improved show in the October 5 assembly polls in Haryana, the INLD and JJP have a tough road ahead. While the INLD has been on a downward slide since 2005, most of the JJP MLAs have deserted the party for green pastures. A report by Rajesh Moudgil
There is a direct contest between ruling BJP and the principal opposition party Congress, and to put it plainly, two players, namely Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) and its breakaway faction Jannayak Janta Dal (JJP), helmed by the Chautala family, face a battle for their survival in the upcoming assembly elections in Haryana.
The JJP had come into existence in December 2018 – after a crippling vertical split in the INLD following a feud in Chautala family – and won 10 seats in 2019; JJP leader Dushyant Chautala became the deputy chief minister forging a post-election coalition with BJP, which came to power for the second term in a row.
The INLD which had its government about two decades ago, has been on a downward slide since. The JJP had come into being after the party supremo and the former five-time chief minister Om Prakash Chautala expelled his grandsons, Dushyant and Digvijay for indulging in anti-party activities, and later also threw out his elder son, Ajay Chautala, for trying to run a parallel party set-up.
Bhupinder Singh Hooda-led Congress government had remained in power for two terms in a row till 2014 when BJP came to power and is eyeing to make a hat-trick.
However, speaking on the party poll prospects, the INLD leaders highlight the party’s tie-up with the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) this election and say that while the INLD would contest 53 out of the total 90 seats, the BSP would fight on the remaining 37 seats this time.
The party media head Rakesh Sihag says that since the voters have now realised the JJP was formed because of its leaders’ greed for power, party’s voters would return to INLD. “Also, the leaders of other parties, BJP and Congress, who are frustrated because of their policies, are in touch with INLD’’, he says and adds that INLD is the only party which has consistently stood by the farmers.
6 JJP MLAs jump ship
The JJP, on the other hand, has suffered an internal crisis with six of its total 10 MLAs leaving the party just a few weeks ahead of the upcoming polls.
The two legislators who resigned from the party earlier this week are Jogiram Sihag from Barwala and Ram Niwas Surjakhera from Narwana. The MLA duo had been openly supporting BJP during the recent general elections despite the repeated objections by the party leadership.
The four other legislators who quit the party a little earlier were Devender Babli, Ram Karan Kala, Ishwar Singh and Anup Dhanak. While Ishwar Singh is close to Congress’ leader Kumari Selja, Kala has already joined Congress.
With these developments, the JJP, which had 10 MLAs, has been left with only four MLAs – Dushyant, his mother Naina Chautala, Amarjit Dhanda and Ram Kumar Gautam. Notably, Gautam can be seen endorsing Congress’ former leader Kiran Choudhry, who has recently joined BJP.
According to media reports, Dushyant held that the BJP would be wiped out of the state this time and the Congress divided the state on the basis of regions in its tenure. Alleging rampant corruption during the Congress regime, he also held Congress did development and gave jobs to the youths of only one region of the state. He further held that the JJP would not only improve its tally but also play an important role in the formation of the government because of the hard work put in by JJP workers.
Meanwhile, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has also been striving for a toehold in the state. The party’s state president Sushil Gupta says that INLD, BSP and JJP had lost their base in the state as the voters had already rejected these parties. In recently held Lok Sabha polls, the AAP, which fought only in the Kurukshetra seat, took more votes than the candidates of these three parties together, Gupta said.
For record, in the House of 90, the ruling BJP in 2019 had won 40 seats, while the Congress secured 31 seats and JJP, 10 seats. The INLD and Haryana Lokhit Party (HLP) each won one seat while seven independent candidates made it to the House. The BJP formed a coalition government with JJP even though most of the independents also backed the saffron party. Manohar Lal Khattar, who belonged to the Punjabi community, continued as chief minister for BJP’s second term, the BJP replaced him with Nayab Saini, an OBC leader while snapping ties with JJP in March, this year.
In the recent Lok Sabha polls, the BJP which had won all the 10 seats in previous polls, came down to five, while remaining five went to Congress.
