Divided Family Marks 113th Birth Anniversary of Former Haryana CM Chaudhary Devi Lal

Four rival branches of Chaudhary Devi Lal's family marked the former Haryana chief minister's 113th birth anniversary with separate events across the state on Friday. Born on September 25, 1914, in Sirsa's Teja Khera village, Devi Lal is still widely remembered as 'Tau' by locals. Workers in Nuh spent Friday putting finishing touches on a stage for the Indian National Lok Dal's Samman Rally, while a team in Sirsa prepared a newly cast statue for installation by the Jannayak Janta Party. INLD chief Abhay Singh Chautala is organizing the Nuh rally, deliberately choosing a district outside the party's traditional Jat strongholds. His guest list includes former Punjab deputy chief minister Sukhbir Singh Badal, Jammu and Kashmir deputy chief minister Surinder Kumar Choudhary, former MP K. Kavitha, Rashtriya Loktantrik Party founder Hanuman Beniwal, and farmer leader Rakesh Tikait. Meanwhile, JJP supremo Ajay Singh Chautala will unveil the new statue in Shakkar Mandori village. Ajay's son, former deputy chief minister Dushyant Chautala, marked the occasion by sharing an artificial intelligence-generated video highlighting Devi Lal's 'Jaccha Baccha Yojna' scheme for poor mothers. Dushyant's brother, Digvijay Singh Chautala, has started building a new house in Chautala village to strengthen his political base, as their ancestral family home was inherited by Dabwali MLA Aditya Devi Lal. A separate branch led by former Haryana power minister Ranjit Singh Chautala held its own district-level programme at his residence on Barnala Road in Sirsa, attended by family members including Gagandeep, Surya Prakash, and Gayatri. Devi Lal entered public life by joining the 1930 Civil Disobedience Movement at age 16 after leaving school in Class 10, later serving as chief minister from 1977 to 1979 and spending 19 months in Mahendragarh jail during the Emergency.