Khattar, Bishnoi rule out any strain in ties with JJP, say alliance govt running smoothly

Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar and senior BJP leader Kuldeep Bishnoi have ruled out any strain in ties with alliance partner JJP and asserted that the government was running smoothly.

Chandigarh: Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar and senior BJP leader Kuldeep Bishnoi have ruled out any strain in ties with alliance partner JJP and asserted that the government was running smoothly. Days before BJP candidate Bhavya Bishnoi filed his nomination papers for the November 3 Adampur by-election, the JPP, which is led by former MP Ajay Singh Chautala, had expressed unhappiness over not finding any mention in the banners and posters put up as part of the campaigning. The BJP had maintained that the party at that time had not officially released any posters, banners or hoardings.

Khattar, who was interacting with reporters after listening to public grievances in Faridabad on Sunday, was asked to if there was any strain in relationship with the Jannayak Janta Party (JJP). "...We are running our government in a very good manner in coordination with our allies. We will win the Adampur bypoll with a very good margin," he replied. On October 10 too, Khattar when asked about some JJP leaders complaining that pictures of their leaders have not been give a space in the posters put up for campaigning in Adampur for the bypoll, had then told reporters in Panchkula that these posters may have come up at local level and had not been officially released by the party.

Khattar had also asserted that both parties will form a common strategy for the bypoll, adding "we will jointly fight these election". The bypoll was necessitated after Kuldeep Bishnoi, father of Bhavya Bishnoi (29), resigned as the MLA from the seat and switched sides from the Congress to the BJP.
Bhavya Bishnoi had also quit the Congress and joined the BJP. Meanwhile, interacting with reporters in Hisar, Kuldeep Bishnoi, when asked if Deputy Chief Minister Dushyant Chautala will come for campaigning, replied, "He should come".

"From the party side too, we will send him a request that he should come as Bhavya is a joint candidate of the BJP-JJP combine and he should come," he said. Kuldeep Bishnoi was also asked about the JJP not seen engaged in campaigning and whether there is any strain in alliance, or is it because of past political rivalry between the Bhajan Lal and Devi Lal families that Dushyant and other senior leaders of the party were maintaining a distance. To this question, he replied, "No, there is no such thing. Our alliance is very good and there is no strain."

"When Bhavya filed his nomination, JJP state president Nishan Singh was present and JJP district president and other leaders also came over for lunch at my residence...We are fighting this election jointly and we will win," Bishnoi said. While Kuldeep Bishnoi is younger son of former Haryana chief minister late Devi Lal, JJP leader Dushyant Chautala is Lal's great grandson. In the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, Brijendra Singh, son of a senior BJP leader, JJP's Dushyant Chautala and Bhavya, who was then in the Congress, contested against each other. Brijendra had won the seat as the BJP swept all the 10 Lok Sabha seats in the state in the parliamentary polls.

In the 90-member Haryana Assembly, where the Adampur seat is currently vacant, the BJP has 40 MLAs while the Congress has 30. The JJP, which is an ally of the BJP, has 10 legislators, while the Indian National Lok Dal and the Haryana Lokhit Party have one each. Seven MLAs are independents. The HLP and six of the independents are supporting the BJP-JJP government. The JJP had extended support to the BJP after the 2019 polls when the saffron party fell short of a majority in the Assembly. Later, independents and the HLP also extended support. (PTI)