Gurugram: The Haryana Congress, which got here inside a whisker of shedding the only real Rajya Sabha seat it set its sights on, is now battling an inside storm. Its appearing state president has stop the celebration and 5 MLAs are going through show-cause notices for allegedly voting towards the celebration’s official candidate within the Rajya Sabha polls the day gone by.

On Tuesday, Ram Kishan Gujjar, working president of Haryana Congress and former Chief Parliamentary Secretary within the earlier Bhupinder Singh Hooda authorities, submitted his resignation to celebration president Mallikarjun Kharge.

At a press convention in Chandigarh, journalists cited Shalley Chaudhary’s identify, together with these of 4 different Congress MLAs who’re suspected to have cross-voted. Hooda neither confirmed nor denied the names. When reporters identified that these named have been conspicuously absent from the press convention whereas different legislators have been current, Hooda mentioned, “Jo nahi hain…”—and let the sentence dangle.

Journalists completed it for him: “Jo nahin hai, sab vahi hai” (those that are absent are those). Hooda smiled.

Requested about Gujjar’s resignation, Hooda was blunt. The resignation, he mentioned, ought to have come from the MLA herself, not her husband.

Later in Delhi, Congress MP Deepender Hooda instructed reporters on the AICC headquarters that the celebration excessive command had already initiated disciplinary proceedings towards those that voted towards the celebration candidate, and that their names could be made public quickly.

Congress MLA from Jhajjar, and a former minister beneath Hooda from 2005 to 2014, Geeta Bhukkal, was extra forthright in declaring Chaudhary’s position within the Rajya Sabha polls. “She was with me throughout our go to to Himachal Pradesh the place Congress MLAs have been lodged in lodges to guard them from ‘poaching’. She was buzzing ‘radhey radhey’ all alongside. Nonetheless…she did disloyalty along with her celebration by voting for the rival,” she alleged.

The Print reached each Shalley Chaudhary and Ram Kishan Gujjar for remark. Chaudhary’s telephone was switched off, whereas the one who answered Gujjar’s telephone recognized himself as his brother and confirmed the resignation, however mentioned he was unable to touch upon the explanations.

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How Haryana Congress almost threw it away

Of Haryana’s 90 MLAs, two from INLD abstained from voting. 5 different votes, 4 from Congress and one from BJP, have been declared invalid whereas 5 Congress MLAs voted for BJP-backed impartial candidate Satish Nandal as a substitute of the celebration’s official nominee Karamveer Boudh. 

That left 83 legitimate votes in play. Beneath the one transferable vote system, the profitable quota labored out to 27.67 votes.

BJP’s Sanjay Bhatia bought 39 first-preference votes and crossed the brink comfortably, together with his surplus transferring to Nandal. Boudh acquired 28 first-preference votes. Nandal accrued 27.33, his 16 first-preference votes plus Bhatia’s transferred surplus. The margin between Nandal and Boudh was a mere 0.67 of a vote.

Notably, 4 of the 5 Congress MLAs who’re being suspected to have voted for Nandal had been a part of the celebration’s “herding” train in Himachal Pradesh for 3 days main as much as the vote, and nonetheless managed to make contact with the BJP-backed candidate.

So as to add to that, the Gujjar-Chaudhary household has a private reference to the BJP. Shalley Chaudhary’s youthful daughter is married to Utkarsh Chaudhary, a nephew of Union Minister of State Krishan Pal Gurjar.

Naraingarh connection & Gujjar’s authorized troubles

Naraingarh carries its personal backstory. It’s CM Saini’s dwelling turf. He gained the seat in 2014, defeating Ram Kishan Gujjar himself. Earlier than that, in 2005, it was Gujjar who defeated INLD and BJP candidates to win the seat.

In 2009, Gujjar’s identify had surfaced in reference to the suicide of a journalist in Naraingarh. A classes court docket in March 2017 convicted and sentenced him to 4 years for abetting the dying of journalist Pankaj Khanna. Nonetheless, the Punjab and Haryana Excessive Courtroom in Could the identical 12 months suspended the sentence handed to Gujjar.

It was this case that stored him from contesting the 2019 meeting elections, resulting in his spouse Shalley Chaudhary’s entry into electoral politics.

The Congress’s subsequent transfer, formal notices to the 5 MLAs and no matter motion follows, will check whether or not the celebration excessive command is keen to behave firmly, or accept a narrowly-averted catastrophe and transfer on.

(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)

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