Haryana polls: Women from top political families in fray

Chandigarh, Oct 7: With October 15 Haryana Assembly elections set to see a record number of 109 women candidates in the fray, all eyes will be on the females from top political families contesting from different seats.

Among the prominent women candidates out there in the fray include Haryana ministers Savitri Jindal, Kiran Choudhary and Geeta Bhukkal, besides Naina Singh Chautala, Renuka Bishnoi, Prem Lata and Shakti Rani. Also throwing her hat in the ring is Vandana Sharma, a teacher-turned-politician and sister of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj.

Savitri Jindal may be one of the richest women around the globe, but she keeps a low-profile and prefers to go door-to- door for campaigning while making short speeches during her public meetings to woo the voters.

The mother of industrialist and former Congress MP Naveen Jindal, Savitri seeks votes on the basis of development works she has carried out in her Hisar constituency, from where she is seeking re-election.

Kiran Choudhary, daughter-in-law of former Haryana chief minister late Bansi Lal, is seeking re-election from Tosham assembly segment in Bhiwani district. Kiran is playing development card while appealing to vote for her and her party.

Another Haryana Minister Geeta Bhukkal is seeking re-election from Jhajjar constituency. She, too, seeks votes on the basis of development works carried out by the Hooda government.

Located in the proximity of Rohtak, the Chief Minister's home constituency, and falling in Congress MP Deepinder Singh's Rohtak Parliamentary constituency, Jhajjar has got a number of development projects.

First woman from the Devi Lal's clan to enter politics, Naina Singh, wife of Ajay Singh Chautala, has entered the poll arena from her husband's Dabwali segment as her husband is behind bars in connection with his sentencing last year in a teachers' recruitment scam.

Naina, who had been a homemaker before taking the plunge into politics, in her public meetings tries to touch the chords of voters invoking her husband's and father-in-law former chief minister O P Chautala's name.

Former chief minister Bhajan Lal's younger son and HJC president Kuldeep Bishnoi's wife Renuka Bishnoi is contesting from Hansi.

Earlier, she was a MLA from Adampur, the constituency from where Bishnoi is now contesting after he lost the 2014 Lok Sabha polls from Hisar.

Renuka while addressing public meetings in her constituency wants the voters to do justice to her husband "whom the BJP has stabbed in the back". She claims that BJP went back on its terms and conditions of the alliance, leaving the HJC in a lurch. She now wants people to teach the saffron party a lesson. HJC recently snapped ties with the BJP accusing it of "repeated betrayal".

From Uchana Kalan constituency in Jind district, senior leader Birender Singh's wife Prem Lata has entered the fray as a BJP candidate. Lata's husband Birender, for whom Uchana has been a stronghold, recently snapped his 42-year-old association with Congress to join the BJP. However, BJP later nominated Lata to contest from Uchana Kalan.

Prem Lata, who is pitted against INLD's Hisar MP Dushyant Chautala, tells voters that it is time to take revenge and show the door to 'outsiders' from the constituency.

In 2009, Birender had lost by a narrow margin of over 600 votes to former Chief Minister Om Prakash Chautala.

Shakti Rani, wife of Haryana Jan Chetna Party chief and former Union minister Venod Sharma, who snapped his four-decade-old ties with the Congress to float his own party recently, has entered the fray from Kalka assembly segment.

In her public meetings, Rani says the people of Kalka are fed up with the policies of the successive governments as the town, which is located along the Himachal Pradesh border, has been deprived of development.

Contesting an election for the first time from Safidon seat, teacher-turned-politician Vandana Sharma is the younger sister of External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj.

Vandana has entered the fray as a BJP candidate. Vandana Sharma has been campaigning in her constituency asking voters to strengthen the hands of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

She appeals to voters to bring BJP to power in Haryana to put the state on higher growth trajectory. Meanwhile with 109 women in the fray, it is the highest ever since the inception of Haryana in 1966.

Earlier, in the 1996 Assembly elections, 93 female contestants were in fray.

PTI