Last Updated on 05/09/2024 by Arun jain
Assembly elections are around the corner in Haryana and it seems that the Bharatiya Janata Party has decided to take on the Congress even in factionalism. Looking at the ticket distribution in the state, it seems something like this. Forget about the common leaders in the state, even the Chief Minister himself has not been able to get his favourite seat. A report in the Indian Express states that CM Nayab Saini wanted the Karnal seat for himself but he has been made a candidate from Ladwa. The differences that were heard in the statements of Haryana BJP President Mohan Lal Badoli and the CM on Friday regarding where the CM will contest the election is a sign of danger for the Haryana BJP.
Mohanlal Badoli had clearly said that day that the CM will contest from Ladwa. While Nayab Saini had said that he is the state president, he would have more information. First of all, Badoli should have kept this information secret till the list came out. The second thing is that did the CM of the state really not know about his own seat till 4 days before the list came out. On this basis, how can it be expected that BJP will be able to compete with its opponents in the state. At present, sources of Bharatiya Janata Party say that Ladwa is the safest seat in the state for CM Saini. Let us see how many chances CM Saini has of winning from Ladwa.
Why did BJP consider Ladwa a safe seat for CM Saini?
Haryana Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini will contest from the fourth constituency since the 2014 assembly elections. In 2014, Saini successfully contested from the Narayangarh assembly seat and five years later, won the Kurukshetra Lok Sabha seat by a margin of over 6.8 lakh votes. For the third time, Saini won from the Karnal assembly seat five months ago, when the party chose him as the Chief Minister in place of Manohar Lal Khattar. He defeated Tarlochan Singh of the Congress by a margin of 41,540 votes. In the 2019 assembly elections, Khattar won from the Karnal seat. This is the reason why Saini wanted to contest from Karnal. But if a report by Express is to be believed, the BJP is considering Ladwa as the safest seat for Saini.
Actually, BJP is considering the results of the recently held Lok Sabha elections as the basis. In the Ladwa assembly constituency falling under Kurukshetra Lok Sabha seat, BJP got 47.14% votes. However, compared to the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, this percentage is much less than 58.5% votes. But in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, BJP’s vote percentage has decreased in the entire state, so this is not a matter of concern. Because the vote percentage received in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections is much higher than the 32.7% votes received in Ladwa in the 2019 assembly elections.
Along with this, BJP believes that Ladwa is a safe seat as it is the hometown of the CM. Saini’s house in Kurukshetra is in Thanesar area. He is originally from Ambala. Secondly, Saini voters are also in large numbers here. Nayab Saini is a role model for them, so it should be expected that hundred percent of Saini votes will go to BJP on this seat. Saini has a good hold here from the organization to the area. It is believed that BJP did not want to take any risk at all, so he has been sent to his home in the assembly elections.
What are the challenges for Saini on Ladwa seat…
According to the 2011 census, 22.6% of the population of Ladwa belongs to the Scheduled Castes. According to the Indian Express report, the Saini community accounts for about 7.4% of the total population here. This assembly constituency is mainly rural, with only 11.78% of the population living in urban areas. According to a report by Dainik Bhaskar, the number of voters here in 2014 was 1.63 lakh, in which the number of Saini community was about 31 thousand, Jats about 27 thousand and the number of Jat Sikh voters is around ten thousand. But many media reports believe that the number of Jat and Saini voters here is almost equal. Looking at the issues of farmers’ movement and women wrestlers, it seems that BJP is going to hardly get the votes of Jats and Jat Sikhs. The votes of Scheduled Castes are expected to be divided between BJP and Congress. Therefore, overall the contest for the CM does not seem very easy here. Perhaps this was the reason why BJP could not win this seat in 2019. The current MLA from Ladwa, Meva Singh, belongs to the Congress and belongs to the Jat community. In 2019, Meva Singh defeated Pawan Saini of the BJP by 12637 votes.
Saini faces many other challenges in Ladwa. Ladwa is one of the four seats in the state where Aam Aadmi Party had taken the lead in the Lok Sabha elections. If Congress and Aam Aadmi Party form an alliance, then obviously Aam Aadmi Party’s candidate can be declared here. Congress had given Kurukshetra seat to AAP in the Lok Sabha elections, and its candidate Sushil Gupta had secured 40.91% votes in Ladwa. INLD has fielded its oldest face Barshami here. If AAP contests the assembly election, it can again make Gupta its candidate. If Gupta becomes the candidate, then BJP’s core Baniya voters can also leave Saini.
Source (PTI) (NDTV) (HINDUSTANTIMES)