'Till a few years ago, girls wouldn't take an autorickshaw alone. Now, things have improved.'
Jobs, the Agnipath scheme, and farmer and wrestler protests.
Sentiments in areas of Haryana on the periphery of the national capital, which vote on Saturday (October 5), revolve around these issues, besides the condition of civic infrastructure.
Improvement in women's safety, though, gets a thumbs up.
In Bahadurgarh, which falls in Jhajjar district and where the Delhi Metro Green Line ends, joblessness comes across as the biggest concern.
Deepak Kumar, a 24 year old who once dreamed of joining the Indian Army but couldn't make it, is now scouting for a job.
"Those who passed the Class 10 exam during the Covid years are joining the army as Agniveers," he says.
"They aren't as educated and also lack the experience that comes with age."
The better educated ones are now in the same league as them, he laments.
His uncle Praveen Kumar echoes the sentiment. "It was unfortunate to see the people of Haryana, the farmers and wrestlers, having to protest," he adds.
Bahadurgarh is going for a fierce electoral contest amidst these issues.
Rajinder Singh Joon, the sitting MLA from the Congress, faces the Bharatiya Janata Party's Dinesh Kaushik.
In 2019, Kaushik's elder brother Naresh had contested the election but lost to Joon by over 15,000 votes.
The BJP ticket went to the younger brother this time round.
Also in the race is the Indian National Lok Dal's Sheela Nafe Singh Rathee, wife of Nafe Singh Rathee, the party's state president who was shot dead this February.
Further down the road from Delhi is Rohtak, which has one of India's largest wholesale cloth markets: Shori Market. Here, jobs, business and infrastructure are the big issues.
Shori Market lies dug up. Its arterial path, which was being rebuilt, will have to wait until after the elections to be ready.
"As it is, we are losing out to e-commerce and organised markets," says a fabric shop owner asking not to be named.
At Rohtak's new bus stand, Ankush Singh, a 20-something Staff Selection Commission aspirant, says because of lack of efficient connectivity, he cannot travel to Delhi for better coaching.
"If only they had extended the Delhi Metro beyond Bahadurgarh."
According to the latest Periodic Labour Force Survey for 2023-2024, Haryana's unemployment rate dropped from 6.4 per cent in June 2023 to 4.8 per cent in July 2024.
However, 9.9 per cent of graduates remain unemployed, compared to 1.9 per cent for those with secondary education and 6.6 per cent for those with higher education.
In their manifestos, both the ruling BJP and the Congress have promised to create 200,000 government jobs in the state.
BJP's Rohtak candidate, Manish Kumar Grover, who had lost to the Congress' Bharat Bhushan Batra in 2019, says his party has improved trade and employment prospects in the state.
He cites the Haryana Kaushal Rozgar Nigam scheme, claiming that it created nearly 200,000 permanent jobs by eliminating the once-thriving thekedaar pratha (middlemen system).
The BJP government, he says, has approved a mega food project at the Industrial Model Township in Rohtak. "We have also pitched for an electric vehicle hub at IMT."
Further ahead of Rohtak, the town of Sonipat echoes with similar problems. The area is poised for a tricky contest.
The Congress' sitting MLA, Surender Panwar, is up against Nikhil Madan, who was with the Congress until July when he defected to the BJP.
"The two, being close friends, will split the votes between them," says Prem Nath, who runs a bookstore in Sonipat. "The victory margin could be below 10,000 votes."
There is one area, though, where people say there has been improvement: Women's safety.
"Till a few years ago, girls wouldn't take an autorickshaw alone. Now, things have improved," says an autorickshaw driver at Rohtak Chowk.
The autos in the city now mandatorily carry the police helpline number.
According to the last National Crime Records Bureau report (2023), while crime against women in Haryana rose by 0.5 per cent in 2022 from 2021, the growth in crime rate declined. From 2020 to 2021, it was 28.1 per cent.
Over the last month or so, Bahadurgarh, Rohtak and Sonipat have seen hectic campaigning, complete with loudspeakers, banners and autorickshaws plastered with colourful posters.
On Thursday evening, all of that fell silent as campaigning came to a close and these cities prepared to enter voting mode.
Feature Presentation: Aslam Hunani/Rediff.com
