Surjewala, Gujjar locked in keen contest

Sushil Manav

Tribune News Service

Kaithal, October 14

Saffron flags of the BJP flutter atop a large number of houses as one enters Keorak, the first village of the Kaithal Assembly segment when one comes from the Ambala side.

Keorak is a big village with a population of 14,051 as per the 2011 census.

“The Kaithal seat will witness a tough fight between BJP nominee Lila Ram Gujjar and Congress leader Randeep Surjewala. In our village, the BJP has an edge,” says a villager. Ujana, the next village, is again a big habitation on the Ambala-Kaithal road. Being the native village of Gujjar, the BJP’s dominance can be felt distinctly.

“Lila Ram is our local candidate while Surjewala shifted his base here from Narwana in Jind district. He chose Kaithal only after Narwana was reserved for Scheduled Castes in the delimitation exercise,” says a villager.

But the moment you enter Kaithal town, the tag of outsider for Surjewala isn’t seen anywhere. Congress flags can be seen almost on all shops on the Park Road where Surjewala is on a door-to-door campaign.

Identical garlands of marigold flowers can be seen lying on the counters of each shop in the market. As Surjewala enters a shop with folded hands, the shopkeeper garlands him and the two pose for a picture clicked by photographers accompanying the Congress leader.

“The entire market is with us. Surjewala has done a lot of development for Kaithal when he was a minister in the Bhupinder Singh Hooda Cabinet. A new hospital, the MC building and the widened roads are all due to him,” claims a Congress supporter.

Om Parkash, a cigarette shop owner near the MC building, says that business has been hit badly ever since the BJP has come to power in the state. “I used to have a daily sale of Rs 4,000 or more, but now I hardly sell goods worth Rs 1,200 to Rs 1,500. People don’t have the money to buy things,” he says.

In the grain market, traders complain of the online system of procurement introduced by the BJP government. However, the biggest worry of the Congress camp is that in the Lok Sabha poll held just five months back, the BJP candidate got an overwhelming lead of over 56,000 votes from Kaithal.

“CM Manohar Lal Khattar has changed the way governments functioned in the past. Go to any village of Kaithal, you will find 15 to 20 youth have got government jobs, all on merit,” says a BJP supporter in the town.

Cong leader battling it out alone

• To mobilise support for BJP candidate Lila Ram Gujjar, Amit Shah has addressed a rally; ML Khattar, Krishan Pal Gurjar and Narendra Tomar have also campaigned.
• In contrast, Randeep Surjewala has been fighting the electoral battle on his own. Even the hoardings installed by Surjewala don’t have pictures of former CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda or state Congress president Kumari Selja.

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