Jind bypoll defeat humiliating for INLD

JIND: Haryana’s main opposition party Indian National Lok Dal (INLD), which had contested the Jind byelection in alliance with BSP, faced a humiliating defeat on Thursday. INLD candidate Umed Singh Redhu not only lost his security deposits but also could fetch 3,454 votes, finishing at fifth place.

Leader of opposition (LoP) Abhay Chautala’s rigorous campaigning for Redhu could not even ensure one-tenth of the votes polled for his nephew Digvijay Chautala, the Jannayak Janata Party (JJP) candidate. Digvijay polled 37,631 votes and remained at second position. JJP had split from INLD less than two months ago.

Such low vote share assumes more significance because the Jind assembly seat was held by INLD for the last two terms. Another major setback to INLD, which claimed to have strong base in the state’s villages, is that it miserably failed to get votes in rural area this time.

Even the apology tendered by Abhay Chautala in Kandela for the incident of firing that had taken place in 2002 during the regime of his father O P Chautala, also failed to help the INLD.

INLD was being projected to have become stronger after its alliance with the BSP in the state but alliance did seem to have worked to it. In most of the booths where it was expected that BSP had significant votes share, INLD lost miserably.

JJP, which was formed by Hisar MP Dushyant Chautala after split form INLD, had emerged as valid substitute. It’s performance was particularly good in the places where INLD was expected to do well — at rural polling booths. Out of the total around 54,000 votes in rural area, JJP managed to get the highest number of around 22,000 votes. INLD could get only 2,478 votes from the villages.

In urban area too, JJP secured around 15,620 votes but INLD could get just 976 votes.

JJP also polled highest number of 1,544 votes in Kandela village, which is the headquarters of the influential Kandela Khap and had virtually turned as epicentre of politics in Jind byelection.

Randeep Singh Surjewala got 1,010, BJP got 724 votes and INLD got just 144 votes in Kandela village. This was despite the fact that INLD candidate Umed Redhu is from Kandela Khap, which had highest number of votes of Redhu gotra.

The political experts have said that Jind byelction results are clear indication that JJP would emerged as the substitute of INLD and serious threat to Abhay Chautala’s political aspirations.

Balwant Takshak, a political expert on Haryana, said that Jind results have proved that the split in INLD has been damaging for Abhay and it is also a clear indication that the people in rural areas are accepting the new outfit. Takshak was also of the view that after the bypoll results, JJP would not have dearth of strong candidates for contesting elections in the parliamentary or the state assembly polls in Haryana this year.

INLD general secretary R S Chaudhary, however, alleged that money played a major role in Jind byelection and JJP had spent huge amount to get votes but INLD candidate was not financially sound. Chaudhary also added that misinformation spread by JJP that they have blessings of O P Chautala was also one of the reasons that they could get such high number of votes.