Haryana BJP legislators want simultaneous state & LS polls, to ‘ride Modi wave after Ram temple event’

Haryana BJP legislators want simultaneous state & LS polls, to ‘ride Modi wave after Ram temple event’

New Delhi: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) legislators and other party leaders from Haryana want the assembly election to be held simultaneously with the Lok Sabha polls. They have conveyed their desire to the central leadership, although the latter is said to have reservations about it, multiple BJP leaders from Haryana and Delhi have told ThePrint.

Assembly elections in Haryana are scheduled for October, months after the Lok Sabha polls. The BJP has been in power in the state since 2014.

The demand of the Haryana leaders, it is learnt, is driven by the results of the assembly elections late last year, when the BJP swept the Hindi heartland states of Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.

“We performed so well in the recently concluded state assembly elections and now we are moving towards the Lok Sabha elections with confidence,” a BJP MLA told ThePrint.

“The fervour that has been created due to the inauguration of the Ram mandir, the central schemes launched by PM Modi… can help us in the state elections too,” the MLA added. “We have put our point across and the central leadership will take a final decision.”

State leaders conveyed their wish to the central leadership during a meeting of the core committee and office-bearers of the state BJP in Chandigarh on 6-7 January.

BJP president J.P. Nadda was in Chandigarh at the time for a roadshow with Haryana CM Manohar Lal Khattar at Panchkula as part of the central government’s Viksit Bharat Sankalp Yatra, which aims to improve awareness about welfare schemes.

While Nadda left after the roadshow, ThePrint has learnt, BJP vice-president Baijayant Panda presided over the meeting.

A senior party leader privy to the meeting said a section of the MLAs expressed their desire to contest the elections under the leadership of PM Modi as it would effectively “cut down any local anti-incumbency”.

According to the sources, Panda didn’t give any hints on whether there was a possibility to hold the polls simultaneously, and instead asked the party functionaries to prepare for winning all the 10 Lok Sabha seats in Haryana.

Earlier, addressing people during his road show in Panchkula, Nadda, too, had expressed confidence that the BJP would win all the state’s 10 seats.

The central leadership has so far indicated that they are not in favour of holding assembly elections along with Lok Sabha polls, with a central BJP functionary saying it “will be a case of bad optics and will show the local unit in a bad light [that it lacks confidence]”.

“The issue was raised by Chief Minister M.L. Khattar earlier and, so far, the party has been busy with preparations for Ram mandir, and has indicated that it doesn’t seem like a good idea,” the leader said. “But now that more MLAs are putting their views across, the party will take a final call after the Ram mandir pran pratishtha,” the leader added.

A BJP MLA who was not present in the meeting admitted on the condition of anonymity that, given a choice, the majority of party MLAs would prefer simultaneous polls “as they would like to swim with the Modi wave they are anticipating after the pran pratishtha of Lord Ram in Ayodhya”.

‘Ab ki baar 75 paar’

In the 2019 Parliamentary polls, the BJP had won all 10 seats in Haryana, riding a Modi wave in light of the Balakot airstrikes, with even former CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda and his son Deepender Hooda losing from Sonipat and Rohtak, respectively.

In the assembly election in October, an enthused state BJP had given a slogan of “Ab ki baar 75 paar (this time, 75 out of 90 seats in the assembly)”. However, the ruling party could win just 40 seats, falling short of a simple majority.

The BJP had to enter into an alliance with Dushyant Chautala’s Jannayak Janta Party (JJP), which won 10 seats, to run the government.

(Edited by Sunanda Ranjan)