Haryana Assembly Elections 2024: Has The Hooda Versus Selja Kumari Factor Impacted Congress?

With counting in Haryana Assembly election underway, the trend so far, according to Election Commission data, shows the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has crossed the halfway mark, and that the Congress is trailing. The exit polls had predicted Congress winning a majority.

The Congress was walking a tightrope throughout the campaign due to an apparent tussle between Bhupinder Singh Hooda–a Jat leader–and Selja Kumari, the party's most prominent Dalit face, with the latter evidently in the sidelines. 

At the time of publishing, Bhupinder Singh Hooda was leading from his constituency, Garhi Sampla-Kiloi, against BJP’s Manju.

The apparent infighting within the Congress came to the fore during the selection of candidates. Of the 90 seats in Haryana, 72 seats have Congress candidates from the Hooda camp. This went against the party's own campaign for inclusivity across communities and particularly impacted the Dalit vote base it sought to regain. 

Selja, a general secretary of the Congress, who has a major influence in the Assembly constituencies in Sirsa and Fatehabad districts of Haryana, did not attend the launch of the party's manifesto and stayed out of the campaigning for the most part. She was reportedly upset over the ticket distribution as she had requested tickets in 30 seats but got only nine, and was unable to convince the party leadership to nominate her close aide Ajay Chaudhary from the Narnaund seat.

The Jat-Dalit consolidation, which was the Congress’ trump card, may not have delivered due to dissatisfaction of the the Dalit vote base with the direction taken by the party’s leadership. The Jat community constitutes about 27 per cent of the state’s population, whereas the Scheduled Castes (SC) constitute around 20 per cent of the population. Dalits in Haryana, particularly the Chamar community, historically sided with the Congress but turned to BJP in the last decade.

According to Rohtak-based senior journalist Sat Singh, “Although Selja Kumari was in the chief ministerial race, she was never going to get the position. Congress was always going to lead with Bhupinder Singh Hooda as they do not want to lose that vote base.”

Congress and BJP, the two main rivals in Haryana this time, have been embroiled in a neck-and-neck battle since counting started. The Jannayak Janta Party (JJP), which had an impressive result in the previous Assembly elections in 2019, seem to have completely collapsed, whereas the Indian National Lok Dal (INLD) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) seem to have gained a few seats. The results of the Haryana polls are expected to become clear later in the day.