Chandigarh: All the political majors in Haryana have stepped up their respective poll drives with the Election Commission on Friday announcing Haryana assembly elections date – October 1 – in single phase.
Briefing newspersons after chairing a meeting of his council of ministers, chief minister Nayab Saini on Saturday claimed that the BJP would form the government for the third consecutive time. Stating that Congress had no issues to raise, and thus has been spreading lies to mislead the people of the state. It would have been better had Congress told the people what had it done during its stint.
He also claimed that the ruling BJP party has taken major decisions for the welfare of the people of the state in the past two terms, and that the people would therefore elect BJP for the third time in a row and teach a lesson to the Congress.
4 JJP MLAs QUIT PARTY
Meanwhile, in a major development, four more legislators of the former deputy chief minister Dushyant Chautala-led Jannayak Janta Party (JJP), quit the party on Saturday. They were Devender Babli, Ram Karan Kala, Ishwar Singh and Anup Dhanak. It may be recalled that two other MLAs of the JJP, Jogi Ram and Ram Niwas Surjakheda have already been siding with the ruling BJP and facing notice by party for anti-party activities..
With this development, the JJP, which had 10 MLAs, has been left with only four MLAs – Dushyant, Naina Chautala, Amarjit Dhanda and Ram Kumar Gautam.
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. Smaller players – Indian National Lok Dal (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. Though 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.
CONGRESS HOLDS RALLIES
Meanwhile, former chief minister and Leader of Opposition Bhupinder Singh Hooda who addressed a rally in Faridabad on Saturday, said the Congress would set up a Migrant Welfare Board if voted to power.
Addressing the Bhojpuri Awadhi Samaj Pravasi Sammelan Hooda said migrants have contributed to building Haryana with their hard work, and played an important role in the development of industries and increase in investment.
Congress Rohtak MP Deepender Hooda also held a rally in Ladwa town of Kurukshetra under his “Haryana mange hisaab’’ campaign.
