Faridabad Lok Sabha constituency is all set for a close contest

BJP candidate for Faridabad Lok Sabha constituency Krishan Pal Gurjar and Congress candidate Mahender Pratap Singh

Faridabad Lok Sabha constituency, adjoining the National Capital Territory of Delhi, is all set to witness a close contest in 2024 with the face-off between senior BJP leader and Union minister Krishan Pal Gurjar and Congress veteran Mahender Pratap Singh.

Both candidates belong to the Gurjar community, which is considered the key to deciding the outcome in this parliamentary seat. Also important is the number of migrant workers in the many industrial units dotting the district.

The earlier contests proved a cakewalk for the BJP leader when in 2014, and 2019, he defeated his nearest rival from the Congress, Avtar Singh Bhadana. He won this seat first by a margin of over 4.6 lakh votes and more than 6 lakhs in the next Lok Sabha election.

This time, Bhadana has reportedly sought to campaign in favour of the Congress candidates in Faridabad and Gurugram Lok Sabha area.

BJP’s 67-year-old Union Minister of State for Power, and Heavy Industries is counting on his experience and the Narendra Modi magic to help him score a hat-trick in Faridabad. He has a considerable political record behind him. In 1994, he won the Corporation Councillor election for the BJP. Two years later, he became an MLA from the Mewla–Maharajpur constituency in 1996 and again in 2000. Incidentally, it was Mahender Pratap who defeated him in 2005 from the same seat he lost in the 1996 assembly elections.

Krishan Pal has been the state transport minister between 1996 and 1999. In May 2014, he became the Minister of State for Road Transport and Highways and Shipping, then for Social Justice and Empowerment. His son Devender Chaudhary is the Deputy Mayor of Municipal Corporation of Faridabad.

His challenger, Mahender Pratap Singh (79) was a member of the Lok Sabha for four terms – from Faridabad in 1991, 2004, and 2009, and Meerut Lok Sabha in 1999. He was formerly an MLA in Uttar Pradesh from the Meerapur Assembly constituency which he won in 2017 on a BJP ticket.

Between 1991 and 1996, Pratap served as a minister in Haryana in the then Bhajan Lal-led Congress government and from 2009 to 2014, when Bhupinder Singh Hooda was the Chief Minister of Haryana. During his tenures, he held various important portfolios, including revenue, industries and labour, local bodies, renewable energy, food supplies, technical education and power.

Of the nine assembly segments comprising Faridabad Lok Sabha constituency, one each went to the Congress and an independent candidate, while the rest were won by the BJP in the 2019 Haryana Legislative Assembly election.

In the last Lok Sabha election, held in 2019, out of its 20,71,816 electors, voter turnout was recorded at 13,27,295 or 64.06% of the total. In 2024, election will be held here in the sixth phase of the poll schedule, on May 25.