In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) swept all 10 seats in Haryana. Five years later, the party could only win half of the 10 seats, losing five to the Congress, including the two scheduled caste (SC) reserved seats, Ambala and Sirsa.
In the 17 Assembly segments reserved for SCs, the Congress led in 11 in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, and its INDIA block ally the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in two more. The BJP led only in four segments. Five years ago, in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP was leading in 15 such segments and the Congress in two.
However, the BJP’s decline in Haryana began five months after its historic performance in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. In the Haryana Assembly elections in October that year, the BJP was able to win five of the 17 reserved seats. of the SC, compared to the nine it had won in the 2014 Assembly elections. The Congress increased its number of seats from four to seven.
In the weeks leading up to the October 5 poll date, Haryana Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini reached out to SCs and the poor with accelerated implementation of several schemes, especially the BR Ambedkar housing scheme. INDIA’s opposition bloc’s narrative of a ‘400 peer’ BJP government that will seek to amend the Constitution to the detriment of marginalized sections will ‘hurt the party’ among Dalits in the LS elections, according to a senior BJP leader. 2024. Since then, the party has been trying to build bridges with Jatavas, Balmikis, Dhanaks and other smaller Dalit communities in Haryana.
The Congress’s focus has been on groups of activists who have deployed to seats with significant South Carolina populations to campaign for the party, and has showcased its Dalit leadership comprising Sirsa MP Kumari Selja and the head of the state unit, Udai Bhan. Two other “Jat-Dalit alliances”, namely the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and the Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) and the Azad Samaj (Kanshi Ram)-Jannayak Janata Party, are also in the fray.
“The Jats might claim to be the largest caste group, but there is no census data to support it. In case of SC, there is data that we are almost 21 per cent of Haryana’s population. Unfortunately, neither the BJP nor the Congress have given us our due share in the power structures. I hope things change after October 8,” said Ashok Bharti, chief of the National Confederation of Dalit Organizations (NACDOR).
First published: October 2, 2024 | 20:01 IS
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