Congress Rajya Sabha member Deepender Hooda on Sunday said he himself and the people of Rohtak were the BJP’s target because the result of Rohtak Lok Sabha seat would not just elect a Member of Parliament but also pave the way for the change of government in the State.
“The Rohtak (Lok Sabha) seat is on BJP’s target. I am on their target and you, the people of Rohtak, are also on the target. I was on their target last time as well. It is because the result of this seat will not only decide an MP but I want to assure you that when the Congress wins this seat with your blessings, it will go on to make the new government at the State,” said Mr. Hooda, who had lost the Rohtak Parliamentary seat to BJP’s Arvind Sharma by a whisker in 2019.
Former Deputy Chief Minister Dushyant Chautala, too, had blamed the split in BJP-JJP alliance over his party’s reluctance to contest the Rohtak Lok Sabha seat, a Hooda bastion. It is likely to be one of the most keenly-contested seats in upcoming Lok Sabha polls.
In an emotional appeal to the electorate, Mr. Hooda, who was speaking at party’s ‘Jan Aakrosh Rally’ in Rohtak’s Meham, said both the BJP and the JJP were reluctant to contest this Lok Sabha seat but he would continue to work for his people “till my last breath”. He said the BJP had its government at Chandigarh and had power of money and media but he only had the blessings of the people to fight the saffron party’s might.
Stating that the rally, held a day after the announcement of the Lok Sabha election schedule, marked the beginning of the election campaign for the party, Mr. Hooda said the BJP had betrayed the farmers, the soldiers, and the youth and the party even had the Constitution on their target.
Attributing his defeat in the previous Lok Sabha election to a “conspiracy”, Mr. Hooda said he had seen democracy being murdered with his own eyes in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, and the people would have also seen it in the recent Chandigarh mayor elections.
He said the BJP and the JJP had made an unannounced decision to call off the alliance six months ago and he had already told this at the Sirsa rally in December last. “The BJP will ask the JJP and the INLD to field candidates to eat into anti-incumbency votes to prevent the change for which people have already made up their mind. It is a trap,” said Mr. Hooda.
Former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and party’s State president Udai Bhan were also present.
