Chandigarh, October 17
The BJP-HJC combine and the Indian National Lok Dal both have won the Hisar Lok Sabha byelection! Sounds strange but it’s true. They have achieved the objective for which they contested the election.

For these parties, the byelection was an opportunity to prove their existence in Haryana politics, which they have done convincingly.

To the Congress, the result is a warning that it can no longer sit smugly that there is no alternative to it before those (non-Jats) who don’t like the INLD leadership or before those (Jats) who don’t like HJC leaders. Both communities have chosen their alternatives. In a sharp caste divide, the non-Jats have gone with the BJP-HJC combine; and the Jats have gone with the INLD.

For the Congress, the result is also a warning that much water has flown down the Ghaggar since 2009, when the party won nine out of the 10 Lok Sabha seats in the state. Even at that time, the Congress had stood third in Haryana. But this time, the defeat is really humiliating. Its candidate, Jai Prakash Barwala, could not even save his security deposit.

There is no one reason behind the Congress debacle. Unbridled inflation, corruption scandals, caste polarisation, which otherwise also has always been the dominant factor in Hisar; and extreme unpopularity of Jai Prakash (it was known to all Congress leaders except Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda) contributed to the rout of the Congress.

To top it all, the Congress infighting did not help the party at all. No wonder, Jai Prakash fared very badly even in the native villages of senior Congress leaders. The Anna factor only added to the woes of the Congress. Though it did not have much effect in Hisar (as accepted by Kuldeep Bishnoi of the HJC and Jai Prakash), the movement made a deep impression on the mind of the electorate that the Congress was not serious about fighting corruption for its own reasons.

For both the HJC and the INLD, the byelection was crucial. For Bishnoi, it was a battle of political survival. His alliance with the BJP has provided a creditable alternative to non-Jats in the state.

The INLD fielded its crown prince, Ajay Chautala, in the fray to prove that its unexpectedly high tally in the last Assembly elections was not a fluke and it was on the move to grab power in the next elections. The party also wanted to prove that despite its top leaders being chargesheeted in corruption cases, it was still popular with its voters.

The one major gain for the INLD is that it has regained its vote-bank, the Jats. The community deserted Jai Prakash when it realised that he was in no position to defeat Bishnoi, son of the man it hated the most, and embraced the INLD.

The Congress has to blame itself for the caste divide in the area. Two incidents - the Mirchpur case and the violence against the property of the non-Jats during the Jat reservation agitation (both happened in Hisar district) - forced the non-Jats to believe that the government was going soft on the Jats.

On the other hand, the Jats blamed the government for being too strict with them in the Mirchpur incident, particularly after AICC general secretary Rahul Gandhi made a surprise visit to the village to express solidarity with the Dalits, who were at the receiving end.

The Congress infighting will sharpen in the coming days, with the dissidents demanding the head of Hooda. How far the high command will concede to the demands of these dissidents is yet to be seen because the Congress has lost all the byelections, the results of which came today.

One thing is certain. Hooda will have to do a serious soul searching. He will have to bypass the bureaucracy and make a direct contact with the people to know what ails his governance. Meanwhile, commenting on the Hisar result, Hooda said he accepts the people’s verdict with all humility.