After BJP’s national president Amit Shah and Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s rallies in Haryana, now Bahujan Samaj Party is planning to bring in its chief, Mayawati to address the voters in the poll-bound State.
The BSP, which could get only one seat out of 90 in the last Assembly elections, is in a buoyant mood this time when the ruling Congress under the leadership of Bhupinder Singh Hooda seems to be on the back foot and the main Opposition party in Haryana INlD is struggling with internal party rift due to its ticket distribution policy.
Several stalwarts of the Congress have left the party recently, weakening it considerably ahead pf the polls. Even the INlD, which took lead in announcing the first list of candidates is facing internal problems. The party’s State leadership failed to keep its flock together in the absence of its national president Om Prakash Chautala, who is behind bar in JBT recruitment scam case.
More than two dozen senior leaders, including sitting and former MlAs besides several parties’ office-bearers, have joined saffron party after leaving the INlD. When the Congress and the INlD are facing internal party rift, the BSP has started chalking out its strategy, concentrating on non-Jat votes.
The BSP is in touch with Vinod Sharma and Gopal Goyal Kanda, who had formed their own separate political outfits namely Haryana Janchetna Party and Haryana lokhit Party.
Even Haryana Janhit Congress Party chief Kuldeep Bishnoi, who is yet to seal a pre-poll pact with the BJP, wants to mount pressure on his ally BJP by showing interest in a non-Jat political platform in which the BSP could be a part. But this could happen only if the alliance with the BJP breaks.
Sources said some senior leaders of the HJC are in touch with Arvind Sharma, the chief ministerial candidate of BSP. Going for social engineering formula in Haryana, the BSP supremo has announced the name of Arvind Sharma, former Congress MP from Karnal as party’s chief ministerial candidate.
The BSP has scheduled four-five rallies of Mayawati in Haryana in September. The party would finalise its list of candidates within a fortnight. On the recommendations of Sharma, the BSP is also planning to cut the names of several candidates, whose names have already been announced in its first list.