The Hindu : Parties waiting for rival lists

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Saturday, Mar 20, 2004

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Parties waiting for rival lists

By Rajesh Ahuja

CHANDIGARH, MARCH 19. The picture is still hazy for the 10 Lok Sabha constituencies in Haryana as the major players --- the Bharatiya Janata Party, the Congress, the Indian National Lok Dal and the Haryana Vikas Party --- are yet to announce their nominees for the polls on May 10. The parties are keeping their cards close to their chest as they apparently wait for the release of lists by their opponents. It is only the Bahujan Samaj Party which has announced candidates for nine constituencies.

The Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) chief and Haryana Chief Minister, Om Prakash Chautala, too has postponed several times the formal announcement of his party's candidates for eight constituencies. The party took the lead in announcing the candidature of the outgoing MP from Bhiwani, Ajay Singh Chautala, who is the elder son of the Chief Minister, and Krishna Malik, the wife of the Haryana Director-General of Police, for the Sonepat seat. Mr.Chautala was to announce his party's candidates at the Jhajjar rally on March 3. However, he did not divulge the names and hinted that the announcement could be made before April 15. But sources close to the INLD leader say that Mr.Chautala would be announcing the candidates soon after the Congress comes out with its choice. It is learnt that the INLD may field at least two of the sitting Ministers from the Hissar and Rohtak constituencies.

The Congress is taking things easily and a meeting of the scrutiny committee, which was to be held at New Delhi yesterday to shortlist candidates, was postponed. According to a senior Congress leader it could take a couple of meetings before a consensus is reached and ultimately the final selection would be approved by the High Command. There is pressure on the State unit President and former Chief Minister, Bhajan Lal, and his arch-rival and Leader of the Congress Legislature Party, Bhupinder Singh Hooda, to contest the Parliamentary elections. Both are members of the Haryana Assembly and strong aspirants for the Chief Minister's post. According to insiders, both the leaders are reluctant to contest for the Lok Sabha and are said to be projecting proxy candidates. However, the High Command is likely to ask both the veteran leaders to jump in the fray. It is also learnt that the President of the All India Youth Congress, Randeep Singh Surjewala, is one of the prominent aspirants for the Hissar seat. He is touring villages in the constituency these days.

The BJP, which broke off its alliance with the INLD, is claiming that it will contest all the 10 Lok Sabha seats on its own. It had won five seats in the 1999 Parliamentary elections while the remaining five were bagged by the INLD. According to political observers, the BJP has hardly any base in Haryana and it has performed miserably at the battle of hustings in the State whenever it fought without any ally.

The BJP circles are agog with speculations that the five sitting MPs including the Union Minister of State, I.D.Swami, would be renominated. However, the party is finding it difficult to get good candidates for the remaining seats and it is not averse to "engineering defections'' or roping in leaders of other parties and Independent MLAs or former MLAs. The BJP leaders are in an upbeat mood as Ranjit Singh, the younger brother of Mr.Chautala, defected from the Congress and joined the BJP. A newspaper baron and a former MP are among its latest acquisitions.

So far as the Haryana Vikas Party is concerned, the party president and former Chief Minister, Bansi Lal, has announced candidates for three seats while the remaining would be announced shortly. Significance is being attached to the nomination of Surender Singh, son of Mr. Bansi Lal, from the Bhiwani key constituency. A triangular fight appears to be certain with the Chief Minister's son, Ajay Singh, also in the fray while the Congress too is likely to field a political heavyweight.

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