What has kept the ruling BJP and the opposition Congress leaders in election mode was the nature of the Lok Sabha election result. The loss to the ruling BJP, both in terms of seats and share of votes, had instilled in their leadership a sense of alarm and urgency of putting extra efforts to defend their citadel on the one hand, and the gain of Congress had doubled the enthusiasm among their rank and file hoping they could unseat the BJP from power in the state.

Both the ruling BJP and opposition Congress and also regional political parties including Jannayak Janata Party (JJP) and Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) have now only about three weeks in hand during which they need to decide on tickets, creasing out the lines that have emerged due to political infighting, and the resolving the issues of political alliances in the state. Therefore, they have to deal with specifics, while keeping up the tempo of theirs being already in election mode.

BJP has been ruling the state for last 10 years, but is now facing an unprecedented challenge that has been revealed by the Lok Sabha Election 2024 result. Just before election its alliance with JJP was broken. The party had also changed its Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar from the Punjabi community with an OBC leader Nayab Singh Saini. However, anti-incumbency against the BJP could not be overcome. BJP ultimately lost its 5 seats out of 10 it had won in 2019 Lok Sabha election, and its vote share also declined by 11.91 per cent. Reversing this trend is therefore of paramount importance for the party, if it wants to retain its power in the state. BJP still hopes to capitalize on OBCs to offset farmers anger against the party.

However, the BJP has not lost all its hopes, since the Lok Sabha result shows that BJP had gained lead in 44 assembly segments as against 40 seats it had won out of 90 in Vidhan Sabha election 2019. BJP leadership hope that by exerting a little bit more the party could attain majority on its own, even there is no NDA in the state since BJP severed its ties with JJP few months ago. BJP leadership also hope that INDIA bloc may not contest unitedly, and therefore they can have upper hand over the Congress in terms of number of assembly constituencies.

The Lok Sabha result shows that JJP and INLD have considerably lost their influence in the state. JJP had won 10 seats in 2019 assembly election but it could not gain lead in any of the assembly segments. The party could bag less than 1 per cent of votes, which has been interpreted as voters’ anger against the party for siding with the BJP. Farmer community are angry with the BJP who seems to have shifted their loyalty away from JJP. INLD had won 1 seat in 2019, but it also met a similar fate, and could not gain lead in any assembly segment, which suggest that farmers community are also not with INLD.

Though Congress had snatched 5 Lok Sabha seats from BJP, and increased its vote share by 15.16 per cent, it had a lead on only 42 assembly segments, 2 less than the BJP. Here lies the challenge for the Congress, which clearly needs an ally to take on the ruling BJP and to have a majority for INDIA bloc. No doubt, the Congress has been resurgent in the state for quite some time which is clearly visible on the ground and in terms of leads in assembly segments compared to the 30 seats the party had won in 2019 Vidhan Sabha election.

Aam Aadmi Party could not win any Lok Sabha seat even though it had contested in alliance with Congress as part of INDIA bloc. However, one can’t ignore that fact that AAP had gained lead in 4 assembly segments.
Thus, INDIA bloc had gained lead in total 46 assembly segments out of 90, which is a clear majority mark, 2 more than the BJP’s lead. However, it is still uncertain whether the AAP and the Congress would contest Haryana Vidhan Sabha election together as INDIA bloc constituents. AAP leadership has reiterated several times that seat sharing arrangement with Congress was only for Lok Sabha election.

Nevertheless, the political situation at the ground level suggesst that the contest will be direct between the BJP and the Congress, barring only about half-a-dozen seats that may witness a multi-corner contest, involving JJP, INLD, AAP (if decides to contest on its own) and some independents. Anti-incumbency is well pronounced against the BJP, and farmers are still angry against PM Modi’s anti-farmer policies, which has given rise to the hope of Congress of snatching power from the ruling BJP in the state in 2024.

State Assembly Election for all 90 assembly constituencies of Haryana Vidhan Sabha, the term of which is to expire on November 4, 2024, will be held in single phase on October 1. A total of 17 seats are reserved for Scheduled Caste. Model Code of Conduct is now in operation with the announcement of the election, and the election schedule is: Notification date - September 5; Last date of nomination - September 12; Date of scrutiny of nomination - September 13; Last date of withdrawal - September 16; and the Date of counting of votes – October 4. A total of 2.03 crore electorate would decide the fate of the political parties, out of which 4.7 lakh are first time voters, while people with disability (PwD) electorates are 1.49 lakh, third gender 455, and 85+ senior citizens 2.46 lakhs. (IPA Service)