Whatever the election, there is definitely a discussion about caste. To win the Haryana assembly elections, both Congress and BJP have done a lot of social engineering. Caste equations have been balanced while giving candidates. Congress has focused on Jats, while BJP has played the card of OBC and upper caste politics. Let us know which party has given tickets to how many candidates of which caste.

While allocating tickets for Haryana elections, BJP has tried to satisfy all castes, but has given more importance to Other Backward Classes (OBC). While finalizing the list of candidates for 90 seats, BJP has fielded OBC candidates for 22 seats. These include Gurjar, Yadav, Kashyap, Kumhar, Kamboj, Rajput and Saini. The OBC population in Haryana is more than 42 percent. BJP has been playing this trick in every election. It has also benefited a lot from it.

BJP's focus on Sarvajan
BJP has given adequate representation to Jats and has fielded Jat candidates on 16 seats. However, this number is less than half as compared to Congress. BJP has focused more on the non-Jat community. The party has given 17 seats to candidates from the Scheduled Caste category. Out of these, 8 are from the Jatav community and 4 are from the Valmiki community. BJP has come to power twice with the support of OBC and Scheduled Caste. After this, the representation of Jats is always beneficial for them.

On whom did Congress bet?
On the other hand, Congress is contesting on 89 seats. It has given one seat to a CPM candidate. Out of these 89 seats, Congress has given 35 seats to candidates from the Jat community. 20 candidates are from the OBC community. The number of Brahmin candidates is 4, while 2 are Baniya and 5 leaders from minority communities have been made candidates by Congress. 6 candidates are from the Punjabi community. One is Rajput. Congress has tried to woo all the sections on 17 scheduled seats. Most importantly, Congress has fielded 30 young faces, 12 women, and 20 new faces in the election fray.