For Haryana's 10 Lok Sabha seats, the Congress is considering names of its senior state leaders, including that of former chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, to take on the BJP which swept the last elections by winning nine seats in the state, party insiders have said.
In the national polls of 2014, Congress won only the Rohtak seat with Deepinder Singh Hooda holding on to his family stronghold.
According to sources within the party, Kumari Selja's name is being considered for the Ambala seat and state unit chief Ashok Tanwar is likely to fight from Sirsa. Both of them have been MPs from these seats in the past.
Capt Ajay Singh Yadav is frontrunner for the Gurgaon seat and industrialist Naveen Jindal may fight the polls from Kurukshetra, they said.
Karan Singh Dalal's name is being considered for Faridabad, however he faces a tough fight from former party MP from the seat Avtar Singh Bhadana, who recently returned to the Congress after quitting the BJP.
Sources said the Congress might spring a surprise by fielding Bhupinder Singh Hooda, who is currently an MLA from Garhi Sampla Kiloi, from the Sonepat Lok Sabha constituency.
Like Rohtak, the adjoining Sonepat parliamentary constituency, which has a sizeable number of Jat votes, is considered to be a bastion of the Hoodas.
If Hooda senior, who was recently made the chairman of the Haryana Congress Coordination Committee, wins the Sonepat seat and his son Deepinder manages to seal another victory from Rohtak, it could make the former a strong contender for the chief ministerial post ahead of the state polls due in October this year, party insiders said.
Among the kin of senior leaders being considered for party tickets is Shruti Choudhary, daughter of Congress Legislature Party leader Kiran Choudhary, from the Bhiwani-Mahendergarh seat, the sources said.
Kuldeep Bishnoi, senior Congress MLA, has been camping for his son Bhavya for the Hisar seat, according to party insiders.
Ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, Congress leaders led by party's state in-charge Ghulam Nabi Azad are travelling on a bus across the state to gather support for the party.
The former chief minister claimed that the Congress in Haryana was fully united and would register a comfortable win in the general elections.
"The entire Congress is one and united under the leadership of our party president Rahul Gandhi," he said.
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