In an unusual show of defiance on October 2, former Haryana Pradesh Congress president Ashok Tanwar’s supporters protested angrily outside 10 Janpath, the residence of Congress president Sonia Gandhi. Tanwar himself made an appearance and addressed the protesters, making known his own grievance against the party’s ticket distribution for the Assembly election in Haryana, and on October 5 left the Congress. This open demonstration of fissures within the party is bound to impact its prospects in the election in the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-ruled State. Haryana and Maharashtra will go to the polls on October 21 in single-phase election, the results of which will be declared on October 24.
In a letter to Sonia Gandhi a few days ago, Tanwar, a former Member of Parliament and Youth Congress president, had announced his resignation from all committees of the State Congress and said it was “excruciating to see the same individuals taking all the decisions and instead of allowing just, fair, free selection of candidates, individuals are selling tickets and subverting the great political legacy of the Congress”. His grouse was mainly directed at former Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, under whose influence the Congress in the State had allegedly turned into “Hooda Congress”. He said that those who had worked against the party had been given the party ticket.Only two of Tanwar's supporters had been accommodated.
The Congress got fewer seats than the Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) in the 2014 Assembly election, which put the BJP in power. Last year, however, it found itself fortuitously catapulted to the position of principal opposition in the 90- member Haryana Assembly when Dushyant Chautala, a grandson of INLD supremo Om Parkash Chautala, broke ranks with the parent party to launch his Janta Jannayak Party (JJP).
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