Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar may not be in the poll fray, yet victory or defeat of the BJP from the Karnal Lok Sabha constituency will fundamentally settle the debate over his popularity.
For Khattar, winning Karnal is essential to silence his critics, both within and outside his party.
This Punjabi-dominated seat is Khattar’s political turf and he knows he would be in the eye of the storm if Karnal is lost. So Khattar made sure none other than his protege, 52-year old Sanjay Bhatia, takes the plunge from here, though this is his first general election.
Karnal, for now, is BJP’s stronghold with the party having its MLAs in 8 out of 9 Assembly segments in this parliamentary constituency. The BJP is banking on the strong polarisation of the non-Jat votes with over 3.5 lakh Punjabi community votes.
Until 2014, not many had heard about Khattar. This debutant won his first election from Karnal and later went on to become the chief minister of the state. Khattar’s honest credentials coupled with his staunch background as an RSS ideologue and an associate of Modi worked in his favour to become a non-Jat CM in Jatland.
Khattar’s pick of RSS ideologue Bhatia, popularly known as ‘Bunty Bhai,’ is inspired by the confidence Modi reposed in him in 2014 when he was termed a greenhorn.
The chant of 'Modi' remains the poll rhetoric for the BJP in Karnal, like in other parts of the state. Bunty Bhai, who has twice unsuccessfully contested the Assembly polls, is pitted against Congress' Kuldeep Sharma, an MLA and former speaker of the state assembly.
Sharma’s father Chiranji Lal Sharma represented this constituency four times. He too is focusing on consolidating non-Jat votes being a Brahmin. In the last 10 Lok Sabha elections from here, the Congress has won the seat seven times. The beleaguered INLD has fielded local party leader Dharambir Padha, a Jat.
There has been opposition to Khattar’s leadership from within his party. MLAs and ministers have expressed resentment over Khattar being at the helm of affairs. Issues of good governance have arguably remained elusive. There have been a series of incidents of complete breakdown of law and order in Haryana under his regime, too. Yet, he has managed to sail through all this.
But losing Karnal will leave Khattar with a lot of explanation to do ahead of the Assembly elections later this year. Illegal mining, joblessness, medical and other infrastructure, lack of avenues are issues bothering people.