Just about a fortnight ago, Manohar Lal Khattar had survived a no-confidence motion brought against his government by the Opposition Congress.

But it was the murmur of no-confidence raised within his own party by cadres at the ground-level is what is believed to have prompted the 69-year-old former RSS pracharak to step down as chief minister of Haryana ahead of the Lok Sabha polls and make way for a fresh face to lead the party in the Assembly polls due for later in 2024.

“There was a disconnect between him and the party cadre. He would not listen to them,” said a BJP leader from Haryana. “Kaam to achchha hi kar rahe the (He was doing well)," he added as an afterthought.

Several leaders in the BJP said that the organizational in-charges for the state had given the same feedback about Khattar, though his personal probity was never in doubt.

According to a section of the BJP in Haryana, the move to replace Khattar was in place for about a year now with party trying to project a more Dalit, OBC-friendly face. In his replacement Nayab Singh Saini, the incumbent Kurukshetra Lok Sabha MP, the BJP has a found someone who could help the party get closer to the nearly 44 per cent OBC population in the state.

Less than two months ago, former Haryana Congress president Ashok Tanwar, who had quit the party barely days before the 2019 Assembly polls, joined the BJP. In Tanwar, a PhD holder in Indian medieval history from JNU, the BJP has found a Dalit leader, to cater to almost 20 per cent of the state’s population.

The OBC-Dalit combination could help the BJP tide over any imminent backlash from the dominant Jat community, who command sway in 40 of the 90 Assembly seats, unhappy with the removal of O.P. Dhankhar as the state unit president last October.

Khattar and Dhankhar had differences that led to friction between the government and the party.

A BJP leader who has worked closely with Khattar over the years said there was no reason to believe that Khattar’s role would diminish in state politics.“Khattar proposed the name of Saini as his successor. Also Saini has said that he will continue the pro-people policies that his predecessor had introduced,” said the BJP leader. “After Saini became the state unit president coordination had improved,” he added.

BJP leader Nayab Singh Saini with former Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar meets Haryana Governor Bandaru Dattatreya to stake claim to form the government in the state, at Raj Bhavan, in Chandigarh. PTI picture.

According to BJP insiders, Manohar Lal remains in the good books of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and is being considered for the Lok Sabha from Karnal. Likewise, Tanwar is a contender for the Kurukshetra seat that would fall vacant with Saini’s move to Chandigarh, the joint state capital of Punjab and Haryana.

“The stronghold that Haryana has become for the BJP in the last ten years, a large part of the credit is due to Khattar,” said a BJP leader.

The mild-mannered but tough-talking Khattar is also known to transfer officials at the drop of a hat, which had upset a section of the bureaucracy as well as the party.

Khattar takes pride in having ended corruption (known as parchi-kharchi system in the local lingo) in recruitment for government jobs.

Following the Jat reservation agitation in 2016, in which 30 lives were lost, he decided to drop his surname, which upset the minority Punjabi-speaking voters of Haryana. Without the 'Khattar' Manohar Lal reminded everyone about the dominance of the Lals in Haryana politics, like Bhajan Lal, Bansi Lal and Devi Lal.

“I was a pracharak till 1994 and no one knew my caste at the time. Even today, I don’t like it when people use ‘Khattar’ after my name. I am just Manohar Lal. That is enough for my identity,” he had said soon after the violent agitation.

In 2014, the BJP had formed the government on its own in Haryana for the first time. The former RSS pracharak, Khattar, who enjoyed proximity to both Modi and Amit Shah, then BJP national president, was a surprise choice since he is a Punjabi.

As the BJP’s organisation secretary in Haryana, Khattar was instrumental in the alliances that the party stitched first with the late Bansi Lal’s Haryana Vikas Party and Om Prakash Chautala’s Indian National Lok Dal, and enabled the BJP to emerge as a force on its own in Haryana.

However, five years later, Khattar found himself in trouble as the BJP fell short of the majority mark in the 90-member Assembly. BJP leaders in Delhi stepped in and a post-poll alliance was stitched with the Jannayak Janta Party (JJP), which had 10 MLAs. The BJP also managed to woo six out of seven Independents to its side, leaving the Congress, also in the race to form the government with 30 seats of its own, high and dry.

Ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP in Haryana is confident of winning all the 10 seats in the state riding on the Ayodhya temple wave, but does not want to take any chances with the next Assembly polls.

The JJP chief and outgoing deputy chief minister Dushyant Chautala had claimed two Lok Sabha seats, Hisar and Bhiwani-Mahendragarh. Brijendra Singh, the sitting BJP MP from Hisar, moved to the Congress on Sunday.

Chautala is a former MP from Hisar and his present Assembly seat, Uchana Kalan, is a part of the Hisar Lok Sabha seat while his father Ajay Chautala had represented Bhiwani once.

But the BJP is not in a mood to listen, at least in Haryana.“The sentiments are running high post the consecration of the Ram temple. In North India, we do not have any reason to fear,” said a BJP leader.

In western Uttar Pradesh, the BJP has wooed the Rashtriya Lok Dal to keep the farmers and the Jat community happy. The party is confident of repeating the 2019 10-0 verdict in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.

“Anti-incumbency, if any, has now been taken care of by bringing in Saini. We will form the government in Haryana for the third time in a row,” said a BJP Haryana functionary.