SATISH HANDA
Shri Manohar Lal and Dushyant Chautala were sworn in as Chief Minister and Deputy Chief Minister of Haryana on October 27. Jannayak Janata Party (JJP) was formed just a few months back on December 9, 2018 by the fourth generation of Tau Devi Lal following family dispute in Chautala family. The family dispute took an ugly turn on October 7, 2019 at a rally organised at Gohan when a group of Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) workers started shouting slogans in favour of Dushyant Chautala. Party supremo Shri Omprakash Chautala, former Chief Minister of Haryana, who is presently undergoing imprisonment at Tihar Jail of Delhi in some corruption cases, suspended Dushyant from the party citing anti-party activity.
As a result, the INLD, which was considered to be the third powerful political party in the state, was divided into two groups when Dushyant, on the consent of his father Ajay Chautala (also undergoing jail term at Tihar Jail), launched his independent political party JJP. Some heavy weight INLD leaders also joined the newly launched party. In these assembly polls it won 10 out of 90 Vidhan Sabha seats. After this victory, Dushyant Chautala joined hands with the BJP to form the government in the state.
Questions arise over the ruling BJP in the state, as the party had won all 10 Lok Sabha seats in 2019 Lok Sabha polls. But now it failed to achieve victory even at minimum 75 seats. The party could win only 40 out of total 90 seats. It is despite 75 poll rallies that were held across the state by nearly 40 stars campaigners including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah and other heavy weights like Yogi Aditya Nath, Smt Smriti Irani, Hema Malini, Sunny Deol, Raj Nath Singh, Nitin Gadkari. Chief Minister Manohar Lal organised ‘Jan Aashirwad Rally’ in Rohtak, which was addressed by Prime Minister Shri Modi to generate awareness about the BJP’s developmental schemes in last five years.
The Congress, divided into several factions, was able to win 31 seats. One of the main reasons of poor performance of BJP in the state is that it refused tickets to as many as 11 MLAs including two cabinet ministers, and offered tickets to the new faces including some of the leaders from rival
political parties who joined the BJP prior to poll. As a result, the graph of BJP witnessed heavy drop. Seven prominent ministers in Manohar Lal cabinet lost seats.
On the other hand, former CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda and HPCC president Kumari Shelja, while talking to media persons in Ambala, admitted that Congress failed to get satisfactory result due to severe rift between senior Congress leaders. Many Congress leaders had left party when they were refused tickets. Another reason was delay in starting poll campaign and absence of the rallies in support of the candidates by senior leaders.
