Of the many political adventures of former Haryana Chief Minister Bhajan Lal, one catapulted him onto the national stage. It was during the early 1980s, when he walked over to the Congress with a government.
That was soon after Indira Gandhi's nascent Congress (I) was swept back into power at the Centre and Mr. Lal, then leading a Janata government in Haryana, just switched sides, giving new meaning to the infamous “Aya Ram Gaya Ram” trend which characterises defections in Indian politics.
For someone who made a grand entry into the Congress party, Mr. Lal remained loyal till 2007, when he chose to float his own party, the Haryana Janhit Congress, owing to the compulsion of State politics, an insatiable ambition to be back in the saddle as the Chief Minister, and love for his son — not necessarily in that order.
Started as a trader
Mr. Lal was truly a grassroots politician. For as a person who started as a trader, he made his way gradually up the slippery ladder of governance, from local bodies to legislature. Yet, even in doing so, he and his followers never forgot their roots and his election office in Adampur remained in the thick of the wholesale market.
In the 2005 Assembly elections, there was no doubt that the Congress would wrest power from Om Prakash Chautala's Indian National Lok Dal (INLD), but the focus among his supporters in the election office was on the margin of victory, for only that could ensure Mr. Lal assumed the office of Chief Minister once again.
The Congress Central leadership, however, had other plans. Having won the State under a Jat leader in Bhupinder Singh Hooda, the party was in no mood to entertain such a thought. Political calculation was clear that if the Congress was to strike strong roots in the State, the leadership had to be from among the Jats, a rich and dominant community constituting about 22 per cent that traditionally favoured the INLD.
Mr. Lal, in spite of being a strong “non-Jat leader” of a loose coalition of different communities constituting about 70 plus per cent, could not secure the top job. Anger at the denial and some cold calculations made Mr. Lal float the party and also groom his then MP-son Kuldeep Singh Bishnoi to take over the mantle as a non-Jat leader — something that they, father and son, could not achieve.
There is always an undercurrent against the Jats in Haryana but the task of bringing together diverse communities such as Brahmins, Ahirs, Dalits and others, is never an easy task. In the passing of Lal, this unwieldy conglomeration would remain leaderless to the benefit of the Jats.
Yet, Mr. Lal would also have to assume part of the blame for not allowing the emergence of leadership from other non-Jat communities. Such were his political management skills that many prominent Jat leaders had grudging respect for this “crafty” neta and his ability to outfox opponents. However, his endgame on the political chessboard showed poor finishing.
