Chandigarh: About 1.55 Crore voters, including 71 lakh women, will seal the fate of 251 candidates in fray for the 10 Lok Sabha seats in Haryana on Thursday. Chief Electoral Officer of Haryana Shrikant Walgad said 60 Companies of Central Para Military Forces and 44,000 personnel of Haryana Police and Home Guards have been deployed to ensure the peaceful conduct of polling.
He said all necessary arrangements, including checking of Electronic Voting Machines, have been done for the polling at 16,129 polling stations, including 11,644 in rural areas.
The 10 Lok Sabha seats will witness four cornered contests between the candidates of ruling Congress, BJP-HJC BL combine, Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) and new entrant Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) though a total of 251 candidates are in the fray.
Meanwhile, about six lakh voters will seal the fate of 17 candidates for the lone Lok Sabha seat from Chandigarh Union Territory.
The main contestants include sitting Congress MP Pawan Bansal, Kirron Kher (BJP) and Gul Panang (AAP) and Jannat Jahan (BSP). In Haryana Congress's Naveen Jindal, Arvind Sharma and Avtar Singh Bhadana are seeking third term from Kurukshetra, Karnal and Faridabad respectively.
Congress nominee of 2009 general election Rao Inderjit Singh is also trying to enter the the Lok Sabha for the third successive term, but this time on the nomination of the saffron party BJP.
Three Congress nominees - Deepender Hooda (Rohtak), Shruti Chaudhary (Bhiwani Mahendargarh) and Ashok Tanwar (Sirsa) and HJC-BL Chief Kuldeep Bishnoi are attempting to enter the Lok Sabha for the second successive term.
From Sonipat, Congress has fielded its Gohana MLA Jagbir Singh Malik after party's sitting MP Jitender Malik opted out of the race. BJP has fielded former MP R L Kataria from Ambala (SC) and Aam Aadmi Party's Yogendra Yadav is among those in the fray from Gurgaon.
Forty-Four candidates, including seven namesakes of HJC-BL Chief Kuldeep Bishnoi are in fray from Hissar. Minimum of 16 candidates each are contesting from Ambala SC and Rohtak followed by 20 from Sirsa SC, 24 from Gurgaon, 25 from
Kurukshetra, 26 each from Karnal and Sonipat and 27 each from Bhiwani Mahendargarh and Faridabad.
Of the 10 Lok Sabha seats, Congress has nine MPs while Haryana Janhit Congress has one MP from the Hissar LS seat. Though the SAD has an alliance with the BJP in Punjab, but its President Sukhbir Badal and his father Chief Minister
Parkash Singh Badal campaigned for saffron party's rivals in Haryana INLD because of close family ties with the Chautalas.
The elections are being fought by the main opposition INLD independently after its attempts to weave a pre-poll tie-up with BJP failed. The party is contesting in the absence of its President and former Chief Minister Om Parkash Chautala, who along with his MLA-son Ajay Singh Chautala, is behind the bars in connection with a 14-year-old teachers recruitment scam.
On the other hand, the ruling Congress finds itself battling 10 years of anti-incumbency while the BJP is fighting the polls in alliance with Kuldeep Bishnoi headed HJC. This time Aam Aadmi Party is looking to replicate its Delhi performance and make an impact in the state's politics. The Arvind Kejriwal-led party is also fighting the polls on its own. The BSP, the Trinamool Congress and a few independents are also in the race.
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