Gurugram: Haryana Deputy Chief Minister Dushyant Chautala’s Jananayk Janata Party (JJP) has toughened its stance regarding seat sharing for the Lok Sabha election after Hisar BJP MP Brijendra Singh switched over to the Congress.
At the end of a meeting of the JJP’s coordination committee at Sirsa on Sunday evening, the party announced that it is looking to contest Hisar and Bhiwani-Mahindragarh seats in alliance with the BJP, or else is ready to contest all 10 parliamentary seats in Haryana.
Currently, all the 10 Lok Sabha seats are with the BJP.
The JJP posted pictures of the meeting and also issued a press release about Dushyant’s interaction with the media at Chaudhary Devi Lal University in Sirsa.
Among those who attended the meeting on Sunday included JJP state president Nishan Singh, senior leader and former Haryana Public Services Commission chairman K.C. Bangar, minister Anoop Dhanak, JJP’s secretary general Digvijay Singh Chautala, MLA Amarjit Dhanda, JJP national general secretary Brij Sharma, and Narnaul Municipal chief Kamlesh Sharma.
“We have so far had two meetings of the coordination committee. The JJP will prefer to contest Hisar and Bhiwani-Mahindragarh seats in alliance with the BJP in the upcoming Parliamentary polls. Otherwise, the party has done all preparations for contesting all 10 seats in Haryana,” the JJP’s press note said, quoting Dushyant Chautala.
It further said that the party has organised rallies in six Lok Sabha constituencies and the next in line is at Hisar on 13 March.
Contacted by The Print, JJP state president Nishan Singh said that initially the JJP was of the view that it should be given three seats in the alliance, but now the party was sticking to Hisar and Bhiwani-Mahindragarh seats.
Dushyant Chautala represented Hisar in the Lok Sabha from 2014 to 2019, while his father Ajay Singh Chautala was the MP from Bhiwani (the name was changed to Bhiwani-Mahindragarh after delimitation in 2008) from 1999 to 2004.
“Dushyant Chautala is likely to meet the BJP leadership on Monday. He has been asked to keep himself free. We are hopeful that the BJP leadership will give us the two seats that have always been our stronghold. However, at the same time the party is prepared to contest all 10 seats, too,” Singh told ThePrint.
Pawan Kumar Bansal, a political analyst from Haryana, said that after Brijendra Singh’s exit from the BJP, the JJP seems to be resorting to pressure tactics knowing well that its senior ally needs a strong Jat leader by its side.
“Though the party has some senior Jat leaders like O.P. Dhankar, Captain Abhimanyu, and Subhash Barala, none of them has won more than one election, and that too riding on Modi wave in 2014. All of them lost in 2019. The party had a strong Jat leader in Birender Singh (Brijendra Singh’s father). With their exit, going with Dushyant Chautala who comes from one of the most prominent political families of Haryana, can be a good option,” he explained.
The JJP’s main opponent was Birender Singh’s family whose political interests clashed with Dushyant Chautala who is eyeing Hisar (represented by Brijendra Singh) as well as Uchana assembly seat, which is Birender Singh’s traditional seat and was represented from 2014 to 2019 by his wife Prem Lata, Bansal added.
(Edited by Tony Rai)
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