South Haryana behindBJP’s crowning glory
While the party continued to maintain dominance on 19 seats for the third consecutive time--2014, 2019, 2024-- there are still 18 assembly constitutes where the party remained unsuccessful in securing a victory in last three years
Defying the exit polls and conquering anti-incumbency, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has managed to create history by securing a hat-trick in Haryana assembly polls.
While the party continued to maintain dominance on 19 seats for the third consecutive time--2014, 2019, 2024-- there are still 18 assembly constitutes where the party remained unsuccessful in securing a victory in last three years.
The 19 seats--10 in south Haryana, seven in north Haryana and two in central Haryana, emerged as major factor in the formation of their government in the state for the third time, the analysis by HT suggests.
In these 19 seats, there are ten seats of south Haryana--Pataudi (SC), Sohna, Gurugram, Bawal (SC), Faridabad, Ballabgarh, Badkhal, Kosli, Narnaul and Ateli--, seven seats from north Haryana, including Ambala Cantonment, Panipat rural, Panipat city, Yamunanagar, Gharaunda, Indri and Karnal and two in central Haryana--Bhiwani and Bawani Khera (SC)--Bhiwani district.
BJP’s veteran leader Anil Vij and Ghanshyam Saraf from Ambala Cantonment and Bhiwani, respectively, has managed to hold on to their seats for the fourth consecutive time. Whereas, Ghanshyam Das Arora from Yamunanagar, Harvinder Kalyan from Gharaunda, Mool Chand Sharma from Ballabgarh , Mahipal Dhanda from Panipat rural and OP Yadav from Narnaul assembly segments have managed to secure the seat for the third consecutive year.
However, the saffron party has not won any seat in Sirsa district and Muslim dominated Nuh district in the last three elections.
There are 18 assembly segments, including three seats from Nuh, five from Sirsa district, three seats (Garhi-Sampla-Kiloi, Meham and Kalanaur) of Rohtak district, two seats of Jhajjar district (Jhajjar and Beri), Baroda in Sonepat, Julana in Jind, Uklana in Hisar, Prithla in Palwal and Adampur in Hisar, where the BJP has failed to win in the last three assembly elections.
Even in 2022, Congress leader Kuldeep Bishnoi turned rebel and he resigned as MLA from Adampur and joined the BJP. His son Bhavya Bishnoi won the by-poll but he lost the 2024 assembly polls to IAS-turned Congress leader Chander Parkash. With this, the BJP failed to win from Adampur in the 2014, 2019 and 2024 assembly polls.
A top BJP leader responsible for spearheading the party strategy in Haryana assembly polls said that their objective was to secure about 22 seats and stop Congress from coming back to power.
“Slowly we began gaining confidence and our workers who were earlier lying low became active. We tweaked our strategy on a day-to-day basis and things started falling in place,” the BJP leader added.
While interacting with media in Gurugram on Wednesday, the Union minister Rao Inderjit Singh said that the people of south Haryana has showed trust in the saffron party from the last three consecutive assembly polls by decimating the Congress.
“This time too, we stopped the anti-incumbency wave and people wholeheartedly backed the BJP. Now, it’s time for the party to give strong representation from south Haryana in the state government,” Rao added.
The BJP has performed excellently by winning 17 seats out of 23 in south Haryana in the assembly polls.
BJP’s media in-charge at party’s state headquarters in Rohtak Shamsher Kharak said that the BJP has collectively contested the elections and they focused their campaign to give jobs on merit basis, reducing corruption and providing social welfare benefits to people.
“We countered Congress’s every narrative and the people rejected their leaders who advocated giving jobs to their loved ones. The BJP has given representation to every caste whether it can be Jats, Dalits, Brahmins, Ror, Gujjars, Punjabis, Baniya, Ahir and others. Our state and top leadership finalised strategy for every seat and micromanagement and booth management also worked for us,” he added.
Retired political science professor Anant Ram said that the Union minister Rao Inderjit Singh played a key role in the BJP’s victory in the last three assembly polls and this time BJP won 10 out of 11 assembly seats that fall in Ahirwal belt of south Haryana.
“Only irrigation minister Abhe Singh Yadav, who does not enjoy good relations with Rao Inderjit Singh lost the election from Nangal Chaudhary and all other 10 seats in Ahir dominated region were triumphed by the BJP. There was huge polarisation in the last week of the poll that helped BJP in winning 48 seats out of 90,” he added.
He further said that the Opposition Congress struggled to make a strong comeback in south Haryana as they failed to create strong local leadership in the region in the last three polls.