The appointment of another backward class (OBC) leader, Nayab Singh Saini, as president of Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Haryana unit in place of Om Prakash Dhankar, a Jat, indicates the saffron party’s reliance on non-Jat votes in the state for electoral victory in the Lok Sabha elections next year to be followed by the state Assembly polls.
Saini, 53, a first-time Lok Sabha member from Kurukshetra known for his closeness to Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar, is expected to strengthen BJP’s hold among the OBC community while Jats – who constitute nearly 30 per cent of the state’s population – are believed to be supporting the Congress, Jannayak Janta Party (JJP) and the Indian National Lok Dal (INLD), the political parties led by Jat leaders.
A senior BJP leader said as the votes of most populous Jat community are largely divided between the Bhupinder Singh Hooda led Congress, Ajay Singh Chautala-led JJP and OP Chautala-led INLD, the party hopes to gain from the consolidation of its main vote bank – non-Jat voters who helped the party in retaining power in the state since 2014 despite absence of leaders with mass base in its ranks to match Congress’ Hooda and Chautalas of the JJP and INLD.
The chairperson, department of political science, Panjab University, Prof Ashutosh Kumar, said Saini’s appointment “is obviously to counter the caste census move of the Congress led INDIA bloc”.
“With Hooda, a Jat, being the face of the Congress, the BJP would obviously look towards Kuldeep Bishnoi and Saini to bring in non Jat votes,” Prof Kumar told The Statesman.
He said nearly 70 per cent of Harayan’s population belongs to the OBCs and scheduled castes (SCs) while land ownership in the state remains heavily with Jats.
Since 2014 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP focused on non-Jat votes, who were agitated over years of nonstop reign by successive Jat chief ministers in the state (INLD’s Chautala to Congress’ Hooda). The BJP, therefore, cobbled up non-Jat alliance against the Jat-centric parties and formed a government under Manohar Lal Khattar, a Punjabi.
With this formula, the BJP won all the 10 Lok Sabha seats in Haryana in 2019 Lok Sabha polls with massive margins. The party fell short of majority in Assembly polls later in 2019 but comfortably formed a government under Manohar Lal Khattar by entering into a post-poll alliance with the JJP.
As both the BJP and ally JJP remain non-committal on contesting elections jointly, Saini’s appointment comes as the saffron party’s preparation for contesting all the 10 Lok Sabha and 90 Assembly seats on its own in case JJP decides against continuing the alliance in the coming polls.
Congratulating the new Haryana BJP president, Chief Minister Khattar said on Saturday that he had had a long association with Nayab Saini and would now work as a team, following the basic principle of the Prime Minister, Narendra Modi’s ‘Sabka Saath, Sabka Vikas, Sabka Prayas, Sabka Vishwas’.
“I have full confidence that the party will become stronger under his leadership and his political experience will play an important role in the promotion and public welfare of the organization and government policies,” he added.
On his part, Saini said Narendra Modi would become the prime minister of the country for the third time and BJP workers in Haryana would play an important role in this by winning ten out of ten Lok Sabha seats.
He said a double engine government would be formed in Haryana for the third time under the leadership of Khattar.