assembly-elections

Updated: Jul 14, 2020 11:35 IST

Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar is meeting BJP Working President JP Nadda and the Independents at the BJP office in Delhi on Friday in efforts to enlist support of enough MLAs for the party to form the government in the state after it fell short of the half-way mark by five seats in the assembly elections.

BJP is in talks with the seven independents along with the Gopal Kanda and Abhay Singh Chautala of the INLD-- all of who won in the Assembly election results declared on Thursday.

Sombir Sangwan from Dadri, Balraj Kundu from Meham, Dharampal Gonder from Nilokheri, Nain Pal Rawat from Prithla and Randhir Gollen from Pundri-- all BJP rebels who won as Independents-- are present for the meeting. Another Independent MLA, Ranjit Singh, who is son of the former Deputy Prime Minister Devi Lal and younger brother of the former Haryana Chief Minister OP Chautala also met Nadda and Khattar on Friday morning.

Khattar has already staked claim but he needs six more MLAs to get a second term as Haryana chief minister.

Dushyant Chautala indicated in an interview to HT on Thursday that his party had “no plans” to support the BJP. “We will have our legislative [party] meeting and then decide the course of action,” he said.

The BJP’s campaign slogan--abki baar 75 paar (this time it will be over 75 seats)—couldn’t live up to its promise as the party was restricted to only 40 seats. This comes mere months after the party swept all 10 Lok Sabha seats.

The Congress, on the other hand, performed better than most exit polls had predicted, winning 31 seats -- more than doubling its previous tally of 15.

BJP is still the single largest party and can stitch together a majority with the help of independents, one Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) MLA and one Haryana Lokhit Party (HLP) legislator.

Khattar, who dashed to Delhi on Friday morning, said he was “optimistic” about forming the government in Haryana.

The Congress too has not given up hope on government formation in Haryana, its talismanic Jat leader and former Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda urged all opposition parties to come together to keep the BJP out on Thursday.

All contesting ministers of the previous Khattar government except Anil Vij (Ambala city) and Banwari Lal (Bawal) lost in the October 21 polls. Heavyweights like Capt Abhimanyu (Narnaul), Ram Bilas Sharma (Mahendergarh), Om Prakash Dhankar (Badli), Krishan Lal Panwar (Israna), Kavita Jain (Sonipat) and, Krishan Kumar Bedi (Shahabad) were handed crushing defeats. Two other ministers, Manish Grover (Rohtak city) and Karan Dev Kamboj (Indri), lost by slender margins.

Chief Minister Khattar won by over 45,000 votes from Karnal and ministers Banwari Lal and Anil Vij also won by over 32,000 and 20,000 votes respectively, to save the BJP blushes.

State BJP president Subhash Barala too was defeated by JJP’s Devender Babli by over 52,000 votes from the Tohana assembly seat in Fatehabad district.

Of the 11 Indian National Lok Dal legislators, who joined the BJP before elections, seven lost. However, the two Congress leaders, who joined the BJP, won.