‘Cong won’t support mayor nominee backed by Hooda’
ROHTAK : Amid the ongoing factional war in the party, Haryana Congress president Ashok Tanwar on Thursday said the party will not support the mayoral candidate backed by former Haryana chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda.
While the Congress had decided not to fight the mayoral elections on party symbol, Hooda had on Wednesday night endorsed the name of Sitaram Sachdeva as the mayoral candidate from Rohtak. Sachdeva filed his nomination on Thursday.
However, Tanwar said it was Hooda’s personal endorsement and the Congress has nothing to do with it. “The party had decided not to be involved in it since it was decided that the polls will not be fought on party symbol. If any leader supports any candidate, it is his personal choice and not the party’s,” he said.
After it was decided that MC elections will be held through direct votes for the first time in Haryana, Tanwar had recommended that the Congress fight these polls on party symbol just like the BJP and other parties.
However, the Hooda group had opposed the proposal and advocated the party’s tradition of never fighting mayoral polls on party symbol. The matter reached the Congress high command and Tanwar was left disap- pointed when the final decision was taken in favour of Hooda.
“A Congress candidate would mean he is fighting on the hand symbol. But that is not happening here. If that happened, the Congress would have swept all five municipal corporation polls. Now, the Congress workers are not bound to vote for anyone. They can choose whoever they like, keeping in mind that we have to defeat the communal parties such as BJP and INLD,” Tanwar said.Tanwar’s comments did not go well with Hooda loyalists, who immediately launched attacks at him.
Meham Congress MLA Anand Singh Dangi, who accompanied Sachdeva when the latter filed his nomination, said Hooda is the face of the Congress in Haryana. “Haryana mein Bhupinder Singh Hooda hi hain Congress, vahin hai sab kuch(In Haryana, Hooda stands for Congress. He is everything),” Dangi said.