At the time of ticket distribution, the top BJP leadership preferred the turncoats over its loyal workers.
Chautala was jailed in 2013 in connection with the teacher recruitment scam case. He was on emergency parole since March 26, 2020, due to the Covid pandemic and was scheduled to surrender on February 21, 2021.
The polls have come at a time when opposition parties in Haryana are in a disarray.
With Haryana facing the prospect of a hung assembly, Indian National Lok Dal chief Om Prakash Chautala on Thursday said that the governor should invite the opposition parties first and give them an opportunity to form the government. "We appeal to the governor to invite the opposition parties first, which have emerged as the largest group. Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda should immediately step down on moral grounds."
Among the seven seats which witnessed a stiff contest between the BJP and the regional parties, the saffron party held three and the Congress two, while the Shiv Sena and the RJD had one each.
The assembly bypolls in Bihar and Maharashtra, scheduled for November 3, are set to be the first electoral test of the popularity of the respective state governments after a change in the political alignment.
In an unprecedented development, MLAs of opposition Indian National Lok Dal in Haryana on Thursday virtually stormed the assembly of neighbouring Punjab to protest against a move that could stall construction of a canal by which Haryana is supposed to receive water.
Former Army chief V K Singh will attend the rally organised by Haryana's main opposition party Indian National Lok Dal in Rewari on Thursday, the party's President Om Prakash Chautala has said.
After getting feelers from the Congress, Haryana Janhit Congress, which won six seats in the recent assembly elections in the state, has decided to be part of the next government in the state."At the first meeting of the Members of Legislative Assembly (after the results were announced), we have decided not to sit in the Opposition. We will be part of the government to work for the people of Haryana," HJC leader Kuldeep Bishnoi said.
Film star-turned politician Yograj Singh is hopeful that his son, cricketer Yuvraj Singh will campaign from him for the October 13 assembly polls in Haryana.
The 31-year-old will have to do the balancing act between his anti-BJP support base and work with the Khattar-led dispensation for smooth governance.
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.
Voting began on Thursday in the by-election to seven assembly constituencies in six states -- a contest symbolic of the fierce turf war between the Bharatiya Janata Party and regional parties.
Dushyant has now emerged as a leader of some reckoning in the Jat community, as well among Haryana's youth.
The Bharatiya Janata Party's bypoll win in four of the six seats it contested has invigorated the party ahead of assembly polls in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh.
Seeking to consolidate its position in Rajya Sabha, the Bharatiya Janata Party is banking on independents for four additional seats and is seeking to capitalise on the infighting within the Congress in as many states in the June 10 biennial election.
Demanding forensic examination of the pens used to cast votes, Hooda said the Election Commission should conduct a thorough inquiry.
Chief ministers and other senior leaders made last-minute appeals to voters for their support in Mokama and Gopalganj of Bihar, Adampur of Haryana, Manugoda of Telangana, Gola Gorakhnath of Uttar Pradesh and Dhamnagar of Odisha.
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Monday favoured a thorough inquiry into allegations of phone tapping with the help of Pegasus spyware which has led to a logjam in Parliament.
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.
All 41 candidates from Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Chhattisgarh, Uttarakhand, Jharkhand and Telangana were elected unopposed on Friday after the biennial elections to 57 Rajya Sabha seats were announced recently.
The results of bypolls to three Lok Sabha and 29 assembly seats spread across 13 states and a union territory have been a mixed bag for the BJP as its fortunes continue to nosedive in West Bengal against the might of Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee while bad tidings have also come from states like Himachal Pradesh and Rajasthan.
Daulatpuria, who had joined the party ahead of 2019 assembly polls after switching over from Indian National Lok Dal, announced his decision at a Panchayat held at his village Daulatpur. Talking to reporters later, he said the three agriculture laws "are anti-farmer which should be repealed immediately".
A day earlier while extending his support to the farmers gathered at Delhi's borders protesting the Centre's new farm laws, Sangwan had tendered his resignation as chairman of the Haryana Livestock Development Board.
Showing signs of differences within the United National Progressive Alliance on the issue of leadership of Mayawati, the Indian National Lok Dal has ruled out the Bahujan Samaja Party chief as its prime ministerial candidate."No to the proposal of her as PM," INLD general secretary Ajay Chautala told reporters in Jaipur on Wednesday when queried if the INLD could join hands with the BSP and project Mayawati as the future prime minister.
Jannayak Janta Party leader Digvijay Singh Chautala on Friday called farmer leader Rakesh Tikait a 'true patriot' and said he has always talked about farmers' interests.
Appealing non-BJP outfits to join hands with the Congress, Hooda assured them that they would be given due respect.
In the years to come, Dushyant may need to compete for the leadership of the Jat community with Hooda's son Deepender, and other Jat leaders, reports Archis Mohan.
Babita and her father Mahavir Phogat, a noted wrestling coach, had joined the BJP in New Delhi on August 12.
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Assembly seats in which the victory margin was less than 1.5 per cent in the 2009 elections.
Maharashtra registered over 64 per cent voter turnout while a record 76 pc polling in Haryana, which witnessed stray incidents of violence, in the first eight hours of polling on Wednesday in the riveting contest to elect assemblies in the two states.
The polling for the sixth phase on May 12 covers 6 states and one Union Territory.
More than two decades after the then Janata Dal disintegrated, six of its constituents merged on Wednesday to form a new party which will be headed by Samajwadi Party president Mulayam Singh Yadav.
Despite the flood of BJP victories, it is difficult to see how regional parties will disappear. These parties not only have the same development goals as the national parties but also promise good governance
Kanyakumari is the tip of India and will convey the symbol that from the tip of India, the Congress is on its way up.
Thousands of Indian National Lok Dal supporters created chaos outside the Rohini court complex on Thursday when former Haryana CM O P Chautala arrived in the jail van prior to the hearing of arguments on his sentencing in the case of illegal recruitment of 3206 junior teachers in the state.
Farmer outfits on Friday started mobilising more batches of peasants from Haryana and Punjab to head towards Delhi's borders to join the ongoing agitation against agri laws, even as political parties such as the Shiromani Akali Dal and the Indian National Lok Dal threw their weight behind them.
As Haryana encountered the 15th rape case in a month on Tuesday, former chief minister Om Parkash Chautala has backed the idea of Khap panchayats to marry of girls early to curb such crimes, citing a Mughal era practice.
Apart from the second pandemic upsurge in Haryana which devastated its cities and villages, in most districts panchayats stopped inviting BJP-JJP leaders to social gatherings, while a few announced a boycott.
Internal bickering in the Haryana Congress on Friday came to the fore with the party "unanimously" passing a resolution demanding action against all those who "sabotaged" the party nominees' chances in the Hisar Lok Sabha bye-election.
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