The bugle for the assembly elections in Haryana has been blown. The difficulties for the Congress party, which is looking to return to power in the state, are no less. Senior party leader Kumari Shailaja is staking her claim for the post of Chief Minister if the Congress gets a majority. She said that people have ambitions at the individual and community level.
Months after winning the Lok Sabha election from Sirsa, the former Union minister and prominent Dalit face of the Congress also hinted at her desire to contest the upcoming assembly elections. She said she wants to work in the state but the high command will take a final decision on the matter.
Rejecting the talk of factionalism, Kumari Selja said when elections come, everyone works on the ground as a Congress camp. “I am very practical and I will answer you very clearly. In any organisation, there is always jostling and competition to make one’s place. This is part of any organisation and it will always be there. Ambition, work, competition to make one’s place, all this is there. But this is only till the tickets are announced. I will also say that when elections come, everyone gets involved in ground work,” she said.
Asked if the various factions in the Haryana Congress will come together, he said, “Everyone has their own ambitions. This is the Congress camp. After all, everyone is working for the party.” He also dismissed talk of factionalism with senior leaders carrying out separate campaign programmes ahead of the polls, saying they are all doing it for the Congress.
Discussing the possibility of a post-poll alliance, Kumari Selja asserted that there will be no hung assembly. The Congress will get a landslide majority. She said, “We are in touch with the people at the grassroots level. They are totally against the BJP. The Lok Sabha results have come and the Assembly elections will also bring very good results and we will form the government.”
Asked if the Congress will declare a chief ministerial candidate before the elections, Selja said there are certain ways of working for the party. “When you are in government, obviously the person who has been the CM leads the party. But when you are in the opposition, the party rarely projects a chief ministerial candidate,” she said.
On the question of whether she is in the race for the post of Chief Minister in case the Congress gets a majority, Selja said, “People have their own ambitions according to their individual and community. Why not?” On being seen as the future Chief Minister of Haryana, she said, “It is for my party and the high command to decide.”
Asked if she had any unfinished business or goals, she said, “Of course, I have a role in the state. I have no qualms about it.” She also said that she has worked at the Centre for a long time and now wants to go to the state level.
Kumari Selja said, “I have done a lot of politics at the Centre. Now I want to work at the state level. People’s work is more connected to the state. So I want to work in the state. The rest is for the high command to decide ultimately. But yes, I definitely want that.”
