Farmer leader Charuni fails to impress voters

Farmer leader-turned-politician Gurnam Singh Charuni, who contested the Assembly elections from the Pehowa segment under the banner of his political outfit the Sanyukt Sangharsh Party (SSP), failed to get much response from the voters.

Congress candidate Mandeep Chatha won the seat by a margin of 6,553 votes. While he was polled 64,548 votes, his nearest rival and BJP candidate was polled 57,995 votes. The remaining seven candidates lost their security deposit. Indian National Lok Dal candidate Baldev Singh Waraich managed to bag 1,772 votes, Jannayak Janta Party candidate Dr Sukhwinder Kaur got 1,253 votes while Gurnam stood fifth with 1,170 votes. Aam Aadmi Party candidate Gehal Singh Sandhu managed to get just 890 votes.

Gurnam Singh, who is also the chief of Bhartiya Kisan Union (Charuni), made attempts to unite the farmers and motivate them to join active politics for ensuring the presence of farmers in the Haryana Assembly, but things didn’t go as planned. Though Gurnam Singh got massive support during various protests and over farmers’ issues across the state, the same unity was not witnessed during the elections.

Even, in the previous Assembly elections, Gurnam had unsuccessfully contested the election from the Ladwa Assembly segment as an Independent candidate.

Gurnam said, “Merely protests and agitations are not going to bring about a change in the lives of the farmers because the power is in the hands of the capitalists and they are not forming policies in favour of the farmers. We have to ensure that the farmers are in the Assembly and the Lok Sabha to get the policies formed in favour of the farmers. We tried but the outcome was not encouraging.”

“During the last phase of campaigning and on the day of polling, fake posts were circulated to defame me. In one such post, it was mentioned that I had extended my support to BJP candidate Jai Bhagwan Sharma and it did a lot of damage. We will soon hold a party meeting to decide the future course of action”, he added.

Charuni blamed former Haryana Chief Minister and Congress leader Bhupinder Singh Hooda for the victory of the BJP in the state.

He said, “I believe the wrong decisions taken by Bhupinder Singh Hooda is one of the prime reasons behind the BJP forming its government for the third time. He sidelined everyone, including Kumari Selja, Randeep Surjewala and many other leaders, which went in favour of the BJP. He should have formed an alliance to stop the BJP. There was the BJP versus the Congress on the majority of the seats due to which the other parties didn’t get much attention.”

Meanwhile, a farmer leader said, “People who support us during the agitations see us as farmers’ union leaders only and we failed to develop a connection with them as well as with the general public. To develop a connection with the masses, there is a need to remain in the field continuously. The last-moment decisions are not going to work.”

Kushal Pal, a political observer, said, “There are very few people, including Arvind Kejriwal, who got success in politics after running social movements, otherwise people who enter the political arena after running social movements don’t get much success. Gurnam has a good following as a farmer leader in the state, but as a politician people don’t connect with him. If he wants to do well in politics, he should leave the casual approach and stay among the people from where he wants to contest.”