In Haryana, suspended Congress MLA’s husband joins BJP, hits out at Hooda

Rishipal says he and wife Renu Bala belonged to Kumari Selja faction and that the Sadhaura MLA was wrongly accused of cross-voting

Rishipal, husband of suspended Congress MLA Renu Bala (pictured), joined the BJP in the presence of Haryana CM Nayab Singh Saini. X/Nayabsainibjp

By: Express News Service

3 min readChandigarhJun 5, 2026 08:23 PM IST First published on: Jun 5, 2026 at 08:23 PM IST

Suspended Haryana Congress MLA Renu Bala’s husband Rishipal on Friday joined the BJP and was welcomed into the party by Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini. Renu Bala is a two-time MLA from Sadhaura.

Though Renu Bala was not present at the event held in her constituency’s Vyaspur area, she had been, for past several days, organizing meetings to invite people to Saini’s programme.

Immediately after joining the BJP, Rishipal accused senior Congress leader Bhupinder Singh Hooda of falsely claiming that his wife had cross-voted in the Rajya Sabha polls.

“In Congress, there is politics of power rather than development. We (Rishipal and Renu Bala) belonged to the Kumari Selja faction. Hooda raised our name in the cross-voting controversy only to weaken Selja,” he claimed.

Rishipal, an engineer by profession, manages Renu Bala’s political activities.

Renu Bala is among five Congress MLAs — the other four being Mohammad Ilyas (Punahana), Mohammad Israil (Hathin), Shalley Chaudhary (Naraingarh), and Jarnail Singh (Ratia) — who were suspended from the party in April for allegedly cross-voting for the BJP-backed Independent candidate Satish Nandal instead of the Congress candidate Karmbir Bauddh in the Rajhya Sabha polls held in March.

Ever since, Renu Bala had been seen attending the state government’s programmes alongside BJP leaders. Last week, the state government had deputed all five suspended Congress MLAs as special invitees in different districts at a state-level function. A few days ago, Renu Bala was also seen sitting with Energy Minister Anil Vij during a grievance committee meeting.

Speaking to the media persons, Rishipal said, “Congress has only suspended Renu Bala, not expelled her. She will stay away from official Congress programmes, but her political identity will continue to be associated with the Congress party, so far”.

Suspension from Congress party does not affect Renu Bala’s membership in the Assembly. However, if she and other four suspended MLAs formally join the BJP or another party, they could be disqualified under anti-defection laws and lose their Assembly membership. Within the Assembly, they would still be required to follow the Congress whip.

Renu Bala’s political career had been an interesting one. She first contested the district council election as an independent candidate. Later, after joining the BJP, she became the chairperson of the District Council. Ahead of the 2019 Assembly elections, she joined Congress in the presence of Kumari Selja.

Talking about Renu Bala’s constituency, Rishipal said, “CM Saini has approved all 21 demands related to the Sadhaura. An additional Rs 5 crore has also been made available for development works”.

Senior BJP leader Balwant Singh who had won thrice from the constituency in the past and lost twice to Renu Bala was also present on the stage when Rishipal was inducted by Saini into the party.