‘Congress blood runs in my veins’: Selja breaks silence on talk of leaving party

Chandigarh: Putting to rest the suspense over her absence from campaigning for the Congress in Haryana, Kumari Selja broke her silence on Monday, as she appeared for a TV interview where she ruled out any chances of her leaving the party and said she will start campaigning on Sept 26 from Narwana.
Even for the interview, Selja’s designation described her as a senior leader of AICC and frontrunner for the top post in Haryana.During her interaction, Selja outrightly rejected talk of her defecting to the BJP. “Congress is a party based on ideology. I was born a Congress worker. Congress blood runs in my veins. My father was wrapped in the Congress flag at the time of his last rites. This is how I shall go as well,” she said.

Confident of Congress making a clean sweep in elections, Selja did not rule out the possibility of being a probable for the top post. “This is the prerogative of the party high command after Congress gets adequate numbers to form the govt. Rest, I am not going anywhere and will work to strengthen the party,” she said.
Her statement has come as a major setback to BJP, whose leaders had been claiming that Congress had ignored Selja, and this had unmasked its anti-Dalit agenda. Union ministers Manohar Lal Khattar and Arjun Ram Meghwal, and even Union home minister Amit Shah, categorically referred the treatment met out to Selja as agenda of Congress.
According to a post by Rajya Sabha MP Randeep Singh Surjewala on a social media platform, Selja will be joining him to campaign for Satbir Dablain, the Congress candidate from Narwana. She is expected to address election meetings in Hisar, Sirsa, Ambala, Kalka, Panchkula and other assembly constituencies.
Since Sept 12, when Congress had released the final list of candidates, Selja had distanced herself from party activities and campaigning in the state. She had been camping at her New Delhi residence. She had been able to get candidature for nine persons, while her close aides like Dr Ajay Chaudhary and Rohit Jain were denied candidature from Narnaund and Ambala City constituencies, respectively. It is believed that high command’s move to give a lion share of tickets to Bhupinder Hooda’s recommendations was one of the reasons for Selja staying away from campaigning.