Congress is six short of majority in Haryana assembly

Chandigarh, Oct 22 : The ruling Congress in Haryana Thursday emerged as the single largest party in the assembly election but failed to tote up a clear majority.

Of the 90 assembly seats, for which the results were declared Thursday, the Congress got 40 seats.

This is six seats short of a simple majority (46 seats). The half-way mark in the 90-member assembly is 45 seats.

The Congress is likely to seek support of Independent candidates, seven of whom won, to form the next government in the state.

The main opposition, Indian National Lok Dal (INLD), made a remarkable recovery from its nine seats in the February 2005 assembly poll by capturing 31 seats on its own.

With one assembly seat won by alliance partner Shiromani Akali Dal, which claimed to create history by winning its first assembly seat in any state outside Punjab, the INLD tally went to 32 seats.

Independents won seven seats while the Haryana Janhit Congress (HJC), led by former chief minister Bhajan Lal and his son Kuldeep Bishnoi, won six seats.

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won four assembly seats while the Bahujan Samaj Party won only one seat.

The Congress had won 67 seats in the February 2005 assembly poll.

--IANS