Khattar, Union Ministers in fray in Haryana
Polling in the 10 Lok Sabha constituencies in Haryana and for the Karnal assembly bypoll will be held on Saturday that will decide the fate of 223 candidates, including big guns like former chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar and Congress’ Kumari Selja. A total of 223 candidates -- 207 men and 16 women -- are in the fray in the sixth phase of the Lok Sabha polls and more than 2 crore people are eligible to vote in the state.
Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini is contesting the Karnal byelection. Voting will be held from 7 am to 6 pm. The BJP had won all 10 Lok Sabha seats in Haryana in the 2019 general elections. For the Lok Sabha elections, Union ministers Rao Inderjit Singh and Krishan Pal Gurjar, former chief minister Manohar Lal and Congress heavyweights Kumari Selja and Deepender Singh Hooda are among the candidates.
Khattar, the BJP candidate from Karnal, is facing Haryana Youth Congress president Divyanshu Budhiraja. Haryana is witnessing a direct fight between the ruling BJP and opposition Congress on most seats.
However, seats like Hisar are witnessing a multi-cornered contest. From Hisar, Power Minister Ranjit Singh Chautala, an Independent MLA who joined the BJP ahead of the polls, is pitted against two members of the Chautala clan -- JJP’s Naina Chautala and INLD’s Sunaina Chautala. Congress’ Jai Prakash is also in the fray. The BJP has fielded industrialist and former Congress MP Naveen Jindal from Kurukshetra.
He is facing AAP’s state unit chief Sushil Gupta and INLD’s Abhay Singh Chautala. Union minister Inderjit Singh and Krishan Pal Gurjar are seeking re-election from Gurugram and Faridabad seats, respectively. The Congress has fielded its senior leader Raj Babbar from Gurugram. Congress’ Kumari Selja and BJP’s Ashok Tanwar are contesting from Sirsa. In Rohtak, Deepender Singh Hooda is up against BJP’s Arvind Sharma. During the high-pitched campaigning for the sixth phase, which ended on Thursday evening, BJP leaders including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union ministers Amit Shah, Rajnath Singh and Nitin Gadkari, and INDIA bloc leaders Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra and Arvind Kejriwal made all-out efforts to garner support for candidates of their parties. Jannayak Janta Party (JJP), Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) have also fielded their candidates in the Lok Sabha polls. JJP’s 10, BSP’s nine and INLD’s seven candidates are contesting the polls.