Gurugram: The Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Sanjay Bhatia and Congress’s Karamvir Singh Boudh won Haryana’s two Rajya Sabha seats late Monday night after hours-long drama over the validity of the ballots.
While counting had been scheduled for 5 pm Monday, the result was finally declared at 1.10 am Tuesday. What transpired in between involved complaints, counter-complaints, a referral to the Election Commission of India (ECI) in Delhi, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge writing to the poll body, and a Congress delegation travelling to meet the Chief Election Commissioner before anyone was allowed to count anything.
The complaints started pouring in even before the polling booths had closed. State minister Gaurav Gautam alleged that the secrecy of Tohana MLA Paramvir Singh’s vote had been compromised. Minister Krishn Bedi raised the same objection against Ellenabad MLA Bharat Singh Beniwal. Congress MLA Bharat Bhushan Batra then filed an identical complaint against Minister Anil Vij.
The matter was referred to the Election Commission. Kharge wrote to ECI alleging what he called a “clear attempt to interfere with the integrity of the election”.
A Congress delegation then went to meet CEC Gyanesh Kumar in person. Senior leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi also sought time with the commission on behalf of the party.
After the scrutiny that stretched well past midnight, Paramvir Singh’s vote was cancelled. Beniwal’s vote and Vij’s vote were both held valid. Counting finally began at 10.25 pm, more than five hours behind schedule. Even then, disputes over cancelled ballots continued during the screening process before the actual count could begin.
When the numbers finally settled, they told a story that will haunt the Congress long after the celebration.
Of Haryana’s 90 MLAs, the Indian National Lok Dal’s (INLD) Arjun Chautala and Aditya Devi Lal did not show up. The party issued a statement that keeping public sentiment in mind, the party had decided to distance itself from both BJP and Congress.
Had INLD voted for BJP-backed Independent Satish Nandal, he would have won.
Of the 88 votes cast, five were cancelled—four of them belonging to Congress MLAs, one to BJP. That left 83 valid votes. Under the single transferable vote system, the winning quota with 83 valid ballots worked out to 27.67 votes.
Bhatia got his 39 first-preference votes from the BJP’s flock and crossed the quota easily, with the surplus transferring to Nandal. Boudh got 28 first-preference votes.
Nandal accumulated 27.33, the 16 first-preference votes he received plus Bhatia’s surplus after the quota calculation. The margin between Nandal and Boudh was 0.67 of a vote.
Five Congress MLAs had voted for Nandal. Four Congress votes were cancelled. The Congress, in other words, wasted nine votes and still won, only because the reduced total of valid votes also lowered the winning threshold, and because Boudh’s 28 first-preference votes still stayed just above that threshold.
Had BJP’s one cancelled vote counted, Nandal would have crossed Boudh, and had INLD’s two MLAs voted for Nandal, he would have won by a margin.
The arithmetic of the result is a story of near-misses for the BJP, and a mirror for the Congress—a win that reflects something deeply uncomfortable about the party’s internal discipline.
Leader of Opposition Bhupender Singh Hooda had personally anchored the Congress operation. He had been in Chandigarh through the three-day herding exercise, while his MP son Deepender Hooda had taken MLAs to Himachal Pradesh.
When Hooda spoke after the result, the relief in his voice was unmistakable. “We faced a very big challenge in this election. We have passed the test by fire,” he said, adding that he would not name those who did cross-voting, but the public would give them the answer.
Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini claimed that almost 25 percent of Congress MLAs had “transferred” their votes. He added that INLD has worked as the B-team of the Congress.
(Edited by Sugita Katyal)