Haryana polls: BJP may drop 40% ministers, top leaders to talk strategy at Nadda’s house today

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) will meet at the residence of its national president JP Nadda on Thursday morning to prepare ahead of the meeting of its central election committee. The meeting at Nadda’s residence will be attended by core party leaders including Union Home Minister Amit Shah, Haryana election in-charge Dharmendra Pradhan, co-in-charge Surendra Nagar, state in-charge Biplab Deb and Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini, as well as other state leaders.

CNN-News18 has exclusively learned the strategy of the party, which aims to form a government in the state for the third consecutive time, despite massive anti-incumbency sentiments.

The party will make sweeping changes to its list of candidates, keeping in mind the chances of winning. “Our sole focus will be to ensure that we analyse each candidate, keeping in mind the dynamics of the seats in question and the candidate’s ability to win that seat,” said a senior source aware of the developments.

Haryana will hold elections in a single phase on October 1. Votes will be counted on October 4.

It is rumoured that 40% of the ministers in the Haryana government could be dropped for the elections. Former minister Sandeep Singh, who has been embroiled in a controversy related to allegations of sexual misconduct, is likely to be left out.

The party is also keen to offer a platform to several women candidates, especially those who have a strong chance of winning. Some of the women candidates who lost the recent April-June Lok Sabha elections and those who did not get ticket in those elections, such as Sunita Duggal, are also likely to contest.

Many factors could work against the ruling party – anti-Jat candidates, anti-Jat sentiment, farmers’ agitation and angst among the fighters. The saffron party’s top brass is well aware of these issues, a source said. “The strategy for the assembly elections will be completely different from what we have seen in the past and the elections will be fought entirely on local issues. In fact, the seats and dynamics could clearly decide the strategy in each section of the state,” a source said.

By fielding Manohar Lal Khattar as a non-Jat chief minister a decade ago, the BJP wanted to send out a strong message in the state dominated by Jat politics. The party will continue to lay special emphasis on wooing the Punjabi OBC and other voters in the state.

At a time when the BJP is facing stiff opposition from the Bhupinder Singh Hooda-led Congress in the state, with talks of fielding wrestler Vinesh Phogat in the works, the saffron party has also kept his cousin Babita Phogat once again on its list of potential candidates.

BJP national spokesperson Rajeev Jaitly, who is currently an advisor to the Haryana chief minister, is also likely to be considered.

The party is also likely to field Bhavya Bishnoi, son of former Adampur MP Kuldeep Bishnoi, and Shruti Choudhry, daughter of newly elected Rajya Sabha member Kiran Choudhry. Rao Inderjit Singh, who is a minister in the Narendra Modi government, has been seeking a ticket for his daughter, Aditi. Considering the dynamics of the region, the party is likely to give her an assembly seat.

When the BJP’s central election committee meets on Thursday evening, the saffron party is likely to nominate candidates for nearly half of the state’s 90 assembly seats. The first list of candidates is expected to be announced on Friday (August 30).

In 2019, the saffron party managed to win 40 of the 90 assembly seats in the state. To form the government, it had to forge a post-poll alliance with the Dushyant Chautala-led JJP. Manohar Lal Khattar continued as the state’s chief minister while Chautala was made deputy chief minister. Just before the Lok Sabha elections, the alliance split and with that Khattar was removed as chief minister and asked to contest the general elections while Nayab Singh Saini replaced him. Recently, Shah announced that in the upcoming assembly elections, the party will opt for Saini as the chief ministerial face.