The BJP registered emphatic victories in seven municipal corporations in Haryana, while its nominees were leading in two other civic bodies in the recently held elections. The Congress, which was hoping to improve its electoral fortunes after a defeat in the 2024 Assembly polls, suffered another setback. The BJP candidates won with large margins in Faridabad, Gurugram, Hisar, Karnal, Rohtak, Sonipat, and Ambala. The BJP was also leading in Yamunanagar and Panipat. In Manesar, an Independent candidate, Inderjeet Yadav, won the mayoral election. The results are seen as a major setback for the Congress, which has been facing internal turmoil and factionalism.
Results for assembly polls in Haryana and Jammu and Kashmir were declared on Tuesday, with the Bharatiya Janata Party scoring a hat-trick in Haryana while the National Conference-Congress alliance emerged victorious in J-K. Here's how some big names fared.
After hectic parleys and much back and forth with the INDIA bloc allies, the Congress also ended up going into the polls with its original plan of largely going solo.
The party has fielded sitting MLA Rajendra Singh Joon from the Bahadurgarh seat.
With the fourth and fifth lists, the party has declared candidates on 88 of the 90 seats.
Besides Hooda, Bhan and Phogat, the Congress has fielded Mewa Singh from Ladwa to take on Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini.
The BJP has fielded as many as 10 turncoats, including those who joined the party from the JJP in recent weeks.
In the Congress's Central Election Committee (CEC) held to discuss ticket allocation for the forthcoming Haryana assembly elections, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi discussed about the possibilities of contesting elections as INDIA bloc, said sources.
The Bharatiya Janata Party, which pulled off a hat-trick of wins in Haryana by bucking anti-incumbency, managed to make significant inroads into the Dalit seats and Jat strongholds.
A land-owning class, the Jats are a powerful community and account for 28 per cent of Haryana's population. The time, they believe, has now come for them to take revenge.
Bucking anti-incumbency, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party pulled off a hat-trick of wins in Haryana to retain power and halt Congress' comeback attempt in the assembly elections, results of which were announced on Tuesday.
Veteran party leader Anil Vij will seek re-election from his Ambala Cantt stronghold.
The voter turnout recorded in the 2019 assembly polls was around 68 per cent.
Since it was formed 58 years ago, Haryana has had Jat chief ministers for 33 of those.
After his party lost power in Haryana in the 2014 polls, the 72-year-old satrap had nothing going in his favour.
According to a police official, the incident occurred when Grover along with the local BJP leaders reached the temple complex as part of their plan to watch from there the live telecast of Prime Minister Narendra Modi unveiling a statue of Adi Shankaracharya at the seer's rebuilt samadhi in Kedarnath.
Sharma's remark came a day after Grover and some other BJP leaders were held up for hours inside a temple complex in Rohtak's Kiloi as several villagers and farmers staged a protest outside.
Appealing non-BJP outfits to join hands with the Congress, Hooda assured them that they would be given due respect.
As per the latest trends, the BJP and Congress is neck-and-neck with 35 seats. The fledgling JJP, which fought its maiden assembly polls, is also ahead in 10 seats.
Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and several of his ministers and Pradesh Congress Committee chief Phool Chand Mullana figure in the list of 68 Congress candidates for the October 13 assembly polls, which was released by the party on Wednesday. While Hooda will contest from Garhi Sampla-Kiloi seat, Mullana has been re-nominated from Mulana. Randeep Singh Surjewala, a minister, has been shifted to Kaithal from Narwana that has become a reserved seat.
At the time of ticket distribution, the top BJP leadership preferred the turncoats over its loyal workers.
Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda on Sunday stormed into the state assembly with a huge margin as his party, Congress, made a clean sweep of all the three byelections in Haryana held on June 2.
Here's how the heavyweights are faring.
The final figure of polling could increase and it will be available on Tuesday, officials said.
The polls have come at a time when opposition parties in Haryana are in a disarray.
The Bharatiya Janata Party-Shiv Sena alliance looked set to return to power in Maharashtra while Haryana could be a cliffhanger with no clear majority for the BJP or the Congress, Election Commission trends indicated.
An analysis of the results in Haryana reveals that caste-based voting is anything but dead. It could even help the Bharatiya Janata Party win a second successive term in the state in the forthcoming assembly polls, reports Nitin Kumar.
It is curtains down for Maharashtra and Haryana assembly polls. Here's a look at political biggies, who made it and who didn't.
In Maharashtra, where the 'Mahayuti' alliance of BJP, Shiv Sena and smaller parties is against the 'Maha-agadhi' led by the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party whereas the ruling BJP is locked in a contest with the opposition Congress and the fledgling Jannayak Janata Party for the 90 assembly seats in Haryana.
Political observers feel that the outcome of the elections weighs in favour of the BJP which had won a massive mandate in the Lok Sabha elections, held earlier this year.
The fate of 1,351 candidates will be sealed by 1.63 crore voters in high-stakes multi-cornered contest in Haryana which goes to polls on Wednesday with top guns including the kin of the three famous 'Lals' battling it out in the state.