Chandigarh: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) gave a humiliating defeat to what were considered as bastions of prominent political families and won all 10 Lok Sabha seats by scoring a perfect 10 in Haryana. In 2014, BJP had bagged seven seats, while the INLD had won two and Congress one. For the first time since Haryana was carved out as a separate state in 1966, it was the BJP's best-ever performance while Congress, the INLD and its offshoot JJP had to bite the dust at the hustings. However, comparatively the BSP and JJP performed better than INLD and AAP.
Proving the exit poll projections right, the Modi juggernaut continued propelling the ruling BJP in Haryana to the top spot in the election 2019. In what came as a twin blow for the Congress was the defeat of father-son duo, former Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and his son Deepender Hooda from Sonipat and Rohtak, respectively. Barring Rohtak, BJP candidates including five of their sitting MPs, won with massive margins. The saffron outfit succeeded in smashing the bastions of the Chautala and Bhajan Lal clans. Besides Hoodas, the other big name who lost was former Union minister Kumari Selja in Ambala.
Of the 11 women in the fray out of a total of 223 candidates, only BJP's Sunita Duggal managed a win from Sirsa reserved seat from where she defeated state Congress chief Ashok Tanwar by a margin of 3,09,918 votes. Union minister Krishan Pal Gurjar registered a massive victory over Congress' Avtar Singh Bhadana by a margin of 6,38,239 votes. Other big wins for the BJP came from Karnal where Sanjay Bhatia won by over 6,54,000 votes; Bhiwani-Mahendragarh from where Dharambir Singh won by 4,35,000 votes, Gurgaon where another Union minister Rao Inderjit Singh won by over 3,82,000 votes and Hisar, where Brijendra Singh won by 3,11,000 votes.
Cong wins 8 seats in Punjab
In Punjab, Congress has won eight of 13 seats it contested. BJP has managed to win two seat, namely Hoshiarpur and Gurdaspur. Actor-turned politician Sunney Deol, who joined BJP earlier this month, has won the Gurdaspur seat with a margin of 80,000 votes. AAP's Bhagwat Mann has managed to win the Sangrur seat for the party. The opposition Shiromani Akali Dal, which was looking to revive itself in the state, could bag only two seats. SAD chief Sukhbir Singh Badal and his wife and Union minister Harsimrat Kaur Badal were the only party candidates who won. Sukhbir won from Ferozepur and his wife, a two-time MP from Bathinda, retained her seat. Sukhbir defeated SAD rebel and Congress candidate Sher Singh Ghubaya with a margin of over 1,98,000 votes while Harsimrat defeated Warring by a margin of 21,772 votes.
