In the run-up to the assembly polls, Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar is confidence personified. Slogans such as ‘Phir ek baar, Manohar sarkar’, ‘MaNo Again’ and ‘Ab ki baar, 75 paar’—rip-offs of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s electioneering catchphrases—define his reelection campaign.
Khattar and his party have plenty of reasons to be upbeat. The BJP swept the Lok Sabha elections here, winning all ten seats. Having come to power in the state on its own for the first time in 2014, the BJP has strengthened its position, consolidating its anti-Jat support base and splintering the Jat votes. The opposition, meanwhile, has diminished at an alarming rate.
The BJP won 58 per cent votes in the Lok Sabha polls, and came second in only 11 of the 90 assembly seats. The Congress’s vote share was 28 per cent, and Om Prakash Chautala’s Indian National Lok Dal, a formidable regional force till not long ago, got barely two per cent votes.
The BJP, however, is not taking it easy, and has been first off the block in launching its poll campaign. Khattar carried out a fortnight-long ‘Jan Ashirwad Yatra’, and Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah have already addressed rallies. The BJP is banking on Khattar’s clean image. The former RSS pracharak who was handpicked by Modi for the top job, may have had a jittery start following criticism of his handling of the violent Jat reservation protests. But, Khattar has succeeded in creating an image of a leader who has given the state a corruption-free and transparent regime. “We have provided an honest government. Every section of the society has benefited,” said state BJP chief Subhash Barala. “We have earned the trust of the people with the work that we have done in the last five years.”
The BJP’s campaign has been boosted by a number of announcements in the past several months, which include a Rs4,750 crore waiver of interest and penalty on farm loans, insurance schemes for small and medium traders, increase in monthly wages of sanitation workers and expansion in the Ayushman Bharat medical cover. A recruitment drive to fill up posts of Group D employees, teachers and policemen was conducted earlier this year. And, the BJP has added nationalism to the mix with issues such as nullification of Article 370 and the promise of having a National Register of Citizens in Haryana.
Khattar has also succeeded in capitalising on the Jat agitation to consolidate the non-Jat voters. The Jats constitute 25 per cent of the state’s population. However, the BJP has appealed to non-Jat voters such as the upper castes, the trading community and the other backward castes. Its victory in the assembly bypoll in Jat-dominated Jind is also seen as the BJP getting the non-Jats to rally behind it. Also, it has taken the fight to the enemy’s bastion, a hallmark of Shah’s style of doing politics. There has been a systematic campaign by the BJP to enhance its influence in Jat areas such as Rohtak, Sonipat, Jhajjar, Jind and Bhiwani. The constant pressure built on political rivals through cases being probed by the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement Directorate are being seen as evidence of the ruthless politicking of the Modi-Shah combine.
However, what makes the BJP confident of a victory, more than its own achievements, is the disarray and despondency in the opposition camp. The Congress has been battling a leadership crisis in the state. Former chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda had been on the warpath, demanding that then state party chief Ashok Tanwar be removed from the post. On August 18, he held a rally where he declared himself a chief ministerial candidate and almost announced his resignation from the Congress. After much delay, a leadership change was finally effected in the state unit.
To get the Jat-Dalit formula working for it, the Congress appointed Kumari Selja, a dalit, as the state party chief, and Hooda, with his formidable standing in the Jat community, as leader of the Congress Legislature Party (CLP) and chairman of the election management committee. The party is raising the issues of farmer strife and the impact of economic slowdown on the life of the common man. Desisting from attacks on the Modi government, it is talking about the Khattar regime’s unkept promises, the limitations of his welfare schemes and the deterioration in the law and order situation. It has also alleged corruption, ranging from illegal mining to fraudulent practices in recruitment, in the state.
While the Congress goes to the people with the work done during Hooda’s ten-year regime, his graph has been on the downslide, with the Jat vote bank appearing to wear thin and corruption cases piling up against him.
The Congress campaign is also suffering from differences within. Tanwar and former CLP leader Kiran Choudhary were missing when Selja took charge as state chief. Tanwar, however, said, “In the last five years, Congress workers and I have worked to strengthen the party. We will work to ensure a victory for the Congress.”
The INLD, meanwhile, has split following differences between Chautala’s sons—Abhay and Ajay. Also, a large number of its leaders moved to the BJP. The absence of Chautala senior, jailed in connection with the illegal teachers’ recruitment case, is not helping matters either. Last December, Ajay’s son Dushyant launched the Jannayak Janta Party, which showed promise as it came second in the Jind bypoll. But the JJP, which allied with the Aam Aadmi Party in the Lok Sabha elections, failed to live up to the expectations. Meanwhile, efforts are on for a reunion of the INLD and the JJP, but it seems the damage has already been done. “I agree that we are not in a very happy situation,” said B.D. Dhalia, state president of the INLD, adding that there is always a possibility of the two parties reuniting ahead of the polls.
The Bahujan Samaj Party recently walked out of alliance talks with the JJP over seat-sharing differences. However, the BSP, which had around six to seven per cent vote share, appears to be more on the margins now. The AAP and Yogendra Yadav’s Swaraj India are expected to be just fringe players.
The BJP, it seems, is set for a return in Haryana.