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Congress candidate Deepender Singh Hooda casts his vote at a polling station in his native village Sanghi in Rohtak on Saturday.
Hooda is in the electoral fray against the BJP candidate and sitting MP Arvind Sharma from the Rohtak seat. Former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda also cast his vote in Rohtak today in the sixth phase of the Lok Sabha polls. Bhupinder Hooda said, "There is a wave in favour of Congress." Congress leader Randeep Singh Surjewala cast his vote at a polling centre in Kaithal, Haryana today. The previous election in 2019 saw Arvind Sharma narrowly defeat Deepender Singh Hooda by just 7,503 votes. Sharma secured 573,845 votes while Hooda received 566,342 votes. Deepender Singh Hooda, who previously held the Rohtak seat for three terms (2005 bypoll, 2009, and 2014), is aiming to reclaim his stronghold. Hooda's family has a longstanding legacy in Rohtak, with his grandfather, Ranbir Singh Hooda, winning the first two Lok Sabha elections in 1952 and 1957, and Deepender's father, Bhupinder Singh Hooda, defeating Chaudhury Devi Lal of the Janata Party. That legacy continued, albeit with brief interruptions, with the third generation retaining the seat; till 2019. The sixth phase of Lok Sabha polls includes eight seats in Bihar, all 10 seats in Haryana, one seat in Jammu and Kashmir, four in Jharkhand, all seven seats in Delhi, six in Odisha, 14 in Uttar Pradesh, and eight in West Bengal. A total of 889 candidates are in the fray. AAP and Congress have also joined hands in Haryana where BJP won all the seats in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Some seats in the state, including Hisar, are witnessing multi-cornered contests. Apart from BJP and Congress, the electoral stakes are high for INLD, Jannayak Janata Party in Haryana. The state will also go for assembly polls months after the Lok Sabha election. (ANI)
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