Rebels played spoilsport in Faridabad, Palwal districts

All candidates who chose to contest as Independents after the denial of the ticket by their parties failed to emerge victorious in various segments falling in Faridabad and Palwal districts. However, their decision to join the fray did affect chances of the official candidates.

While Sharda Rathore from Ballabgarh and Lalit Nagar from Tigaon were Congress rebels, Nayan Pal Rawat, Deepak Dagar at Prithla and Kehar Singh Rawat at Hathin were BJP dissidents. Though they lost the elections, they made the contests multi-cornered ones. Sharda, a former two-time MLA of the Congress, gave tough time to Mool Chand Sharma, a Cabinet minister and senior BJP leader, before she lost by a margin of 17,730 votes in the Ballabgarh segment. Though Sharma scored a hat-trick, the result led to embarrassing moments to the supporters of the Congress as its official candidate Parag Sharma could get only 8,674 votes. Parag, a first-timer, failed to get the support of any star campaigner, including former CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda or any senior national leader for the campaign.

Tigaon is the second segment where Congress’ candidate Rohit Nagar had to be content with 21,656 votes and finished third behind Rajesh Nagar of the BJP and Lalit Nagar, an Independent candidate. Lalit contested the poll after being denied the Congress ticket. Though Lalit lost by a margin of 37,401 votes to the BJP candidate, it is claimed that the contest could have been close if the Congress had put a united face.

The Prithla segment also witnessed a similar situation. While Congress candidate Raghubir Singh Tewatia won with a margin of 20,541 votes over BJP’s Tek Chand Sharma, entry of two BJP rebels made the Congress win easier as Nayan Pal Rawat (22,023 votes) and Deepak Dagar (16,055 votes) polled a total of over 38,000 votes that could have gone to the BJP had they not contested against Sharma, according to poll analysts.

Interestingly, Prithla is the only segment in Faridabad and Palwal district which has not fallen to the BJP so far since it came into being in 2009.

Hathin, a segment in Palwal district, witnessed a similar situation, where two BJP rebels, who contested as Independents, managed to garner 15,439 votes, The Congress candidate defeated the BJP nominee with a margin of 32,396 votes. The INLD candidate also dented the margin of both the winner and the loser as he fetched around 37,843 votes.