Indian National lok Dal (INlD) on Tuesday decided to postpone the declaration of its list of candidates for ten parliamentary constituencies in Haryana to March 13. Abhay Chautala, son of INlD chief Om Prakash Chautala, said that they will release the list of candidates for all ten constituencies of Haryana on Thursday.
According to sources, INlD chief Om Prakash Chautala, who is behind bars in JBT scam case along with other senior leaders at Delhi, had called his State president, Ashok Arora and son Abhay Chautala at Delhi to announce the list of candidates.
But at the last moment, some senior BJP leaders, who want an alliance between INlD and BJP for parliamentary elections, met Chautala senior on Tuesday and asked him to postpone his scheduled programme (announcing the list of candidates) for two more days, and now INlD would release the list of its candidates on March 13.
BJP too has also called meeting of its Election Committee on March 13 at Delhi and it is also expected to declare the list of its candidates for Haryana parliamentary constituencies on the same day.
Both the parties want to have alliance for the parliamentary elections but the bone of contention is BJP’s ally Haryana Janhit Congress (HJC), which enjoys patronage of some senior BJP leaders, including Sushma Swaraj, Nitin Gadkari and Arun Jaitley, also do not want leave HJC when elections are round the corner.
“We have already said that we would not shake hand with BJP unless or until, Congress’s B team (HJC) has any connection with it”, said Abhay Chautala.
Akali Dal patron Prakash Singh Badal has been trying for an alliance between BJP and INlD but so far nothing has materialised. Badal enjoys a good equation with the Chautalas.
BJP, which has little support in the rural Haryana, requires the help of INlD, to get support of all sections, particularly the Jat votebank. INlD has a strong hold amongst the Jat voters of the state. But BJP is apprehensive about the stigma of corruption cases (JBT Scam) on the senior leaders of INlD, which may damage BJP at national level.
Sources claimed that both BJP and INlD would perhaps help each other indirectly in the general elections-2014. INlD could give tickets to weak candidates against BJP to help the party.
Abhay Chautala has already announced unconditional support to Narendra Modi, prime ministerial candidate of BJP. On the other hand, BJP would support INlD to form the government in the upcoming Assembly elections in the State. And both the parties had worked on the similar equations in the past too.