The BJP is contesting 89 of Haryana’s 90 assembly seats polls by itself. The exception is Sirsa, where the BJP’s Rohtash Jangra withdrew his nomination, raising speculation about an undeclared poll understanding with Gopal Kanda’s Haryana Lokhit Party, BSP and INLD.

“INLD, BSP, BJP and Kanda sahab, everyone’s aim is the same; to defeat the Congress. Everyone is together,” Jangra told Newslaundry. “I got a call from the party leadership that I had to file my nomination…the leadership again told me to withdraw my nomination…Gopal Kanda is with our NDA. We have withdrawn our nomination in his support. Now I am campaigning for him.”

At Jangra’s office, we met HLP’s Sirsa organisation secretary Pradeep Gupta. Asked about his party’s alliance, he said that Kanda, INLD leader Abhay Singh Chautala as well as BSP will help the BJP.

Similar questions linger over the poll contest in Ellenabad, where Abhay Chautala is facing a tough challenge against the Congress’s Bharat Singh Beniwal, and where many feel the BJP has deliberately fielded a weak candidate. But BJP’s Ellenabad candidate Amir Chand Mehta denies these claims.

Asked about the equation with BJP, Chautala told this reporter to go back to Delhi.

Watch.