Haryana: The Congress hits the ground running

Haryana chief minister Naib Singh Saini appears to have been caught unawares. When he addressed the media on the morning of August 16, he announced the transfer of Rs 525 crore to farmers as a bonus for losses due to deficient rainfall. Just hours later, at 3.00 pm, the Election Commission of India announced that single-phase polling for the 90-member Assembly would be held on 1 October.

In 2019, the election was held on 21 October and results were declared on 24 October. The chief minister was sworn in on 27 October and newly elected members were administered the oath on 5 November, the first day of the three-day Assembly session.

Five years on, with the life of the present Assembly expected to end on 5 November, Saini wasn’t the only one taken by surprise. The announcement was clearly not expected, as borne out by a hurriedly prepared list of officers to be transferred before the model code of conduct kicked in. A cabinet meeting scheduled for 17 August to announce more sops to voters was put off.

Having failed to notify the decision to make all contractual employees permanent, BJP leaders were chagrined at another opportunity lost. With the left hand oblivious of what the right hand was doing, it was indicative of a 10-year-old BJP government adrift.

The Congress, raring to return to power after 10 years, was better prepared. Congress leaders seem to have hit the ground running after the Lok Sabha results were declared on 4 June. The party has been swamped by ticket aspirants and will have to rush to finalise candidates in the next two weeks. The likes of Deepender Hooda and Kumari Selja, among the party’s frontline leaders in the state, are on the move, leading yatras, addressing rallies, drawing large crowds and exuding confidence that the party is set to win the election.

State Congress president Uday Bhan points out that the party has been on the ground all along with its ‘Jan Milan Samaroh’, ‘Haath Se Haath Jodo Abhiyan’, ‘Vipaksh Aap ke Samaksh’ even before Deepender Hooda kicked off the ‘Haryana Maange Hisab Yatra’ and Kumari Selja embarked on the ‘Sandesh Yatra’. Bhupinder Singh Hooda also launched the ‘Ghar Ghar Congress, Har Ghar Congress’ campaign on 15 January 2024.

The fact that Hooda and Selja have moved separately had set tongues wagging in the BJP, but even if there were differences, the leaders seem to have put it aside in the larger interests of the party. On the other hand, the BJP seems embattled both within and outside. In an attempt to deflect attention from his party’s predicament in the run-up to the election, the rattled chief minister Naib Singh Saini has accused Congress leaders of spreading lies and posed 10 questions to former chief minister Bhupinder Hooda.

When Saini asks: “What did you do for farmers in your 10 years?”, Hooda Sr calmly rebuts: “The Congress gave loan waivers, electricity bill waivers and MSP to farmers while the BJP gave them lathis and bullets.” Come 4 October, and the BJP will be out of Haryana, he says, adding that “this BJP government has spent the last 10 years introducing useless schemes like Property ID, Family ID, Meri Fasal, Mera Byora, which is why it is forced to ask these questions [about my term] rather than talk about its own work”.

“During the Congress tenure,” he elaborated, “the National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT) in Panchkula, the National Institute of Design (NID) in Kurukshetra, the Kalpana Chawla Medical College in Karnal, the Bhagat Phool Singh Women’s University in Sonipat, the IIT Extension Centre and the National Institute of Food Technology were established… The Congress government had set up 12 government universities, 45 government colleges, six medical colleges, four thermal power plants and a nuclear power plant in the state.”

The upswing in the fortunes of the Congress is also indicated by the 2,556 ticket aspirants who paid Rs 20,000 as an application fee for general candidates and Rs 5,000 for SC, OBC and women candidates. The BJP has not come out with similar details. Barring the government’s official functions and chief ministerial visits, the BJP is yet to launch any significant political campaign on the ground.

Anti-incumbency against the BJP government was a feature in the 2019 Assembly election as well, when the party won 40 seats, six short of the majority. It managed to form the government with the support of 10 MLAs of the Jannayak Janta Party (JJP) led by Dushyant Chautala, who was installed as deputy chief minister.

The electoral reverse came in the wake of the BJP winning all 10 Lok Sabha seats in the 2019 general election. The Congress had secured 31 seats and the remaining nine seats were won by independents and others.

Insiders felt that Manohar Lal Khattar’s lacklustre performance as chief minister cost the BJP the election. Despite this, he was reinstated. Ahead of the Lok Sabha election this year, Khattar was asked to quit and name his successor. He chose Naib Singh Saini, a confidante, overlooking stronger candidates.

While the BJP hoped Saini would be able to consolidate OBC voters, OBCs in the state are not happy. While OBCs are estimated to constitute 30 per cent of the state’s population, Sainis constitute just one per cent. Ahirs, with larger numbers, are already restive and feel that Union minister of state Rao Inderjit Singh would have been a better replacement.

Moreover, Saini has allowed the bureaucrats in the CMO (chief minister's office) — most of them appointed by Khattar — to run the show for him. While he is more accessible than Khattar and has visited every district in the last five months, his impact is yet to be felt.

Saini’s ineptitude became glaringly evident when he announced Minimum Support Prices (MSP) for as many as 24 crops. It was swiftly pointed out that this was the exclusive prerogative of the Union government. To add to the embarrassment, his attention was drawn to the fact that several of the 24 crops are not even grown in the state.

Anti-incumbency against the BJP government accelerated over its handling of the farmers’ agitation in 2021–22. While farmers from Punjab provided the manpower, farmers from Haryana managed the logistics. The crackdown on farmers by the Haryana police was the last straw.

Rising unemployment, inflation and the controversial and unpopular Agnipath scheme have also become major issues in the state. While the Agnipath scheme was pushed by the Union government, the state government is expected to bear the brunt of it as Haryana fed the army thousands of new recruits every year.

The Union government’s abominable treatment of women wrestlers, all of them from Haryana, plummeted the BJP’s popularity ratings even further. The state government’s silence over the issue and its reluctance to support its ‘daughters’ angered villages where wrestling is a popular sport.

The resentment grew over the subsequent treatment of Vinesh Phogat, who faced unimaginable obstacles before finally getting selected to the Paris Olympics by sheer dint of personal grit and courage.

When she came back home, after a stunning performance before her unfortunate disqualification in the finals, and Congress leader Deepender Hooda was among those who received her, there were accusations of politicising her homecoming. BJP leaders were conspicuous by their absence even as crowds cheered all along her 13-hour journey by road from Delhi airport to Balali village. Far from feting her, BJP supporters trolled Vinesh, a detail unlikely to be forgotten or forgiven by the people.