In Haryana, Kumari Selja picked for Sirsa Lok Sabha seat, Deepender Hooda Rohtak

Geetanjali Gayatri

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Tribune New Service

Chandigarh, April 25

After weeks of deliberations, the Congress today released its list of candidates for eight of the nine Lok Sabha seats it’s contesting in Haryana. No name has been announced for the Gurugram seat so far.

Haryana has 10 Lok Sabha constituencies. The tenth seat, Kurukshetra, has been allocated to INDIA bloc ally AAP. The list released by the party has Leader of Opposition in the Vidhan Sabha and former CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda’s stamp over it with most of the candidates from his camp. The big “losers” include MLA Kiran Choudhry whose daughter Shruti was denied a ticket from the Bhiwani-Mahendragarh seat. She has been replaced by Hooda loyalist Rao Dan Singh while former Union minister Birender Singh’s son Bijendra singh, the sitting MP from Hisar, who recently switched from the BJP to the Congress, was today denied ticket from Hisar. The party has decided to field Jai Prakash, again a Hooda loyalist, from the seat.

While Deepender Singh Hooda has been fielded from Rohtak, party’s SC face Kumari Selja has been nominated from Sirsa (SC) where she will be locked in battle with BJP’s Ashok Tanwar, a former Congress state chief.

Ambala (SC): Varun Choudhary

Hisar: Jai Prakash

Karnal: Divyanshu Budhiraja

Sonepat: Satpal Brahmachari

Bhiwani-M’garh: Rao Dan Singh

Faridabad: Mahendra Pratap

Varun Chaudhary, a sitting MLA and son of senior Congress leader Phoolchand Mullana, also owing allegiance to Hooda, has been fielded from Ambala (SC). Rao Dan Singh, the party’s Ahir face and sitting MLA, has been picked for the Bhiwani-Mahendragarh seat while Divyandhu Budhiraja, a loyalist of Deepender, will contest his first election from Karnal against ex-CM Manohar Lal Khattar. He has been the president of the Students’ Council of Panjab University. Satpal Brahmachari has been fielded from Sonepat. Hailing from Jind district, he left Haryana at a young age and moved to Haridwar. He had contested on the Congress ticket from the Haridwar Assembly constituency unsuccessfully, in 2022.

The party has chosen former minister Mahendra Pratap over another ticket aspirant, Karan Dalal, from Faridabad. The party has reposed faith in two sitting MLAs while only one woman has been given a party ticket from the state. Sources said the party is still undecided about Gurugram where the name of the actor-turned-politician Raj Babbar has been doing the rounds.