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Naveen Jindal, Ranjit Chautala join BJP, get ticket from Kurukshetra, Hisar

By, Chandigarh
Mar 25, 2024 06:56 AM IST

In yet another surprise, the BJP fielded Ranjit Singh Chautala, an Independent MLA from Rania segment and a cabinet minister in Haryana, from Hisar, also within hours of inducting him into the BJP fold in Sirsa on Sunday

Former Congress MP Naveen Jindal will contest the 2024 Lok Sabha election from Kurukshetra on a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ticket, the party announced hours after the industrialist-turned-two-term MP joined the fold in New Delhi on Sunday.

Former Congress MP Naveen Jindal will contest the 2024 Lok Sabha election from Kurukshetra on a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ticket, the party announced hours after the industrialist-turned-two-term MP joined the fold in New Delhi on Sunday. (PTI)
Former Congress MP Naveen Jindal will contest the 2024 Lok Sabha election from Kurukshetra on a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) ticket, the party announced hours after the industrialist-turned-two-term MP joined the fold in New Delhi on Sunday. (PTI)

In yet another surprise, the BJP fielded Ranjit Singh Chautala, an Independent MLA from Rania segment and a cabinet minister in Haryana, from Hisar, also within hours of inducting him into the BJP fold in Sirsa on Sunday.

Chautala, 79, who is the son of former deputy prime minister Devi Lal and brother of Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) chief and former Haryana chief minister Om Prakash Chautala, has been a cabinet minister in the Haryana government since October 2019. In 1990, he became Rajya Sabha MP and is a two-time MLA (1987 and 2019).

The party has picked its sitting MLA from Rai segment, Mohan Lal Badoli, for the Sonepat parliamentary seat, replacing Ramesh Chander Kaushik, its two-time MP from this seat.

From Rohtak, it has again gone with sitting MP Arvind Kumar Sharma, a dental surgeon, who had defeated three-time MP and Jat heavyweight Deepender Singh Hooda of the Congress from the Rohtak parliamentary seat in 2019 by a close margin of 7,503 votes.

With this, the party has declared nominees for all 10 parliamentary seats of Haryana.

6 fresh faces, 4 old war horses

The BJP has positioned new candidates in six seats namely Ambala, Kurukshetra, Karnal, Hisar, Sirsa and Sonepat, while reposing trust in its old war horses in Bhiwani-Mahendergarh, Rohtak, Gurugram and Faridabad.

Earlier, the BJP had released a list of six candidates from Haryana and retained three sitting MPs namely Rao Inderjit Singh Yadav (Gurgaon), Krishan Pal Gurjar (Faridabad) and Chaudhary Dharambir (Bhiwani-Mahendragarh). The BJP had dropped first-time MP Sunita Duggal from Sirsa (SC seat) and fielded Ashok Tanwar, who recently joined the BJP after quitting AAP. Also, BJP picked Manohar Lal Khattar from Karnal to contest the Lok Sabha election, after the former chief minister resigned in a dramatic change of guard in Haryana.

The BJP had to field a new face from Hisar after its sitting MP Brijendra Singh joined the Congress. In Ambala, it gave the ticket to Banto Kataria, the widow of former MP Rattan Lal Kataria. She is the sole woman who has found a place in the BJP candidates’ list from Haryana.

Earlier in the day, Naveen Jindal, announced his decision to quit the Congress on social media platform ‘X’ (formerly Twitter).

“I represented Congress party in Parliament as Kurukshetra MP for 10 years. I thank the Congress leadership and the then Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh. Today, I am resigning from the primary membership of the Congress Party,” Jindal wrote on ‘X’ ahead of joining the BJP in New Delhi at the party headquarters in the presence of its general secretary, Vinod Tawde.

Notably, in the outgoing Lok Sabha, Kurukshetra was represented by Haryana chief minister Nayab Singh Saini, who recently replaced Manohar Lal Khattar as the CM.

Ranjit Singh Chautala joined the BJP in the presence of Ashok Tanwar, who is the party candidate from Sirsa. Shortly after BJP announced names of four more candidates from Haryana including Jindal and Ranjit Chautala, Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini posted in Hindi on X, “I can say with full confidence that we will win 10 out of 10 Lok Sabha seats in Haryana...”

(With inputs from Sunil Rahar in Rohtak)

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Know the candidates

Naveen Jindal (53): Kurukshetra MP (2004-2014)

He won from Kurukshetra Lok Sabha seat in 2004 and 2009 on Congress ticket. In the 2014 general elections, he was defeated by then BJP’s Raj Kumar Saini after which he did not contest the 2019 general polls. His father OP Jindal, who died in a helicopter crash, served as power minister in Haryana government and his mother Savitri Jindal also remained a minister in Bhupinder Singh Hooda government.

Arvind Sharma, 61, Rohtak MP (2019-2024)

The three-term MP is a dental surgeon by profession, who had defeated three-time MP and Jat heavyweight Deepender Singh Hooda of the Congress from the Rohtak parliamentary seat in 2019 polls by a close margin of 7,503 votes. He has represented Karnal Lok Sabha seat as Congress candidate and won as an independent from Sonepat Lok Sabha seat in 1996. He had joined the BJP ahead of the 2019 Lok Sabha polls.

Mohan Lal Badoli (63): The first-time MLA of the BJP from Rai in Sonepat district. He also remained Sonepat district president of BJP. He is the first BJP leader who has won from Rai assembly seat. Badoli belongs to Brahmin community and is the general secretary of the BJP in Haryana. He is the first BJP leader to win from Rai assembly seat.

Ranjit Singh Chautala (79): The son of former deputy prime minister Devi Lal and brother of Indian National Lok Dal chief and former Haryana chief minister Om Prakash Chautala, is an Independent MLA from Rania segment. He has been a cabinet minister in the Haryana government since October 2019. In 1990, he became Rajya Sabha MP and became MLA in 1987 and 2019.

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