Devi Lal, Hooda kin slug it out in Haryana

Chandigarh: Ever since Haryana was carved out as a separate state way back in 1966, its politics has revolved around four prominent political families -- those of Devi Lal, Bhajan Lal, Bansi Lal and Bhupinder Singh Hooda. Earlier, Haryana’s three famous Lals, Devi Lal, Bansi Lal and Bhajan Lal, ruled the state by turn for decades.

Before the BJP came to power on its own strength in 2014, it was the Hooda family which called the shots. The kin of the two famous Lals, former chief ministers Bansi Lal and Bhajan Lal, who over the years had been entering the fray during the parliamentary polls, have not got the ticket from their respective parties.

However, four members of the family of former deputy prime minister Devi Lal, popularly known as ‘Tau’ Devi Lal, have entered the contest from the Hisar and Kurukshetra seats. Interestingly, three members of the Devi Lal family -- Lal’s son Ranjit Singh Chautala, an Independent MLA who switched over to the BJP recently; JJP MLA Naina Chautala (57), who is wife of JJP chief and Devi Lal’s grandson Ajay Singh Chautala; and Sunaina Chautala (47), wife of INLD leader Abhay Singh Chautala’s cousin Ravi Chautala -- are contesting against each other from the Hisar parliamentary seat. Ravi is the son of Devi Lal’s son late Partap Singh Chautala.

INLD leader Abhay Singh Chautala is contesting from the Kurukshetra seat. However, Shruti Choudhary, grand daughter of former chief minister Bansi Lal, has been denied the Congress ticket from the Bhiwani-Mahendragarh seat. The ruling BJP too did not consider fielding Kuldeep Bishnoi or his son Bhavya Bishnoi from the Hisar seat. Kuldeep is former chief minister Bhajan Lal’s younger son. The Congress has fielded sitting MLA Rao Dan Singh from Bhiwani-Mahendragarh while the BJP went with Ranjit Singh Chautala from Hisar. Shruti Choudhry was elected MP from Bhiwani-Mahendergarh in 2009, but BJP’s Dharambir Singh defeated her in the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha polls.