Former Haryana Chief Minister and Congress leader Bhupinder Singh Hooda on April 7 exhorted party cadre to keep vigil on Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) on polling day, and ensure 90% turnout to guarantee his party’s win in the Rohtak Lok Sabha constituency.
Though the Congress is yet to announce its candidates for Haryana, Mr. Hooda’s son and Rajya Sabha MP Deepender Hooda is most likely to contest from Rohtak, the Hooda family’s bastion.
Referring to Mr. Deepender Hooda’s loss by a whisker to the BJP’s Arvind Sharma in the 2019 Lok Sabha election, Mr. Hooda, addressing a ‘Jan Aakrosh’ rally in the Rohtak parliamentary constituency’s Beri Assembly segment, said the electorate in the region had voted overwhelmingly for his son, but the turnout should be 90% this time to ensure a lead of at least one lakh votes from the Assembly seat.
He also exhorted party cadre to not leave the polling booths till the election process was over, and keep vigil on the EVM. Mr. Hooda said that if agents stayed at the booth till the completion of the entire voting process, tampering with the machines would not be possible.
The septuagenarian leader said he was pained to see that Haryana, which was number one in per capita income and investment during the Congress’ rule before 2014, now had the highest unemployment rate in the country with deteriorated law and order.
He also reiterated the Congress’ promise of ₹6,000 as old age pension, 300 units of free electricity, and cooking gas cylinder for ₹500, besides reintroducing the Old Pension Scheme in the “first Cabinet meeting”.
