The Hindu : Congress likely to lose some weight

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Dec 01, 2003

Other States

Other States - Rajasthan

Congress likely to lose some weight

By Sunny Sebastian

JAIPUR NOV. 30. At the end of the fortnight-long noisy and at times acrimonious election campaign in Rajasthan, on the poll-eve both the ruling Congress and the main Opposition, the Bharatiya Janata Party, are claiming a favourable mood for themselves from the 339.12 lakh electorate in the State.

There are as many as 1,541 candidates in the fray with 200 Assembly seats up for grabs and barring a few seats it is going to be a direct confrontation between the Congress and the BJP.

The fight for the Congress which came back to power in the State after a gap of eight years in 1998 with a three- fourth majority is to retain power even if it means with a smaller margin while for the BJP it is improving upon its current position of 35 seats in the Assembly.

Even when the Rajasthan Chief Minister, Ashok Gehlot, has been maintaining throughout the campaign period that the effort was to improve upon the 1998 tally of 153 seats for the party, on the ground it looks difficult for the Congress to do so. The party has to shed its weight and its losses, in the absence of any other party, are going to be the gain of the BJP.

As such against 200 seats contested by the Congress, the BJP is contesting only 197 seats leaving three--Kushalgarh, Bagidora and Danpur in Banswara district--to its partner at the Centre, the Janata Dal (United). The Janata Dal (U) has sitting MLAs in all these seats.

The other BJP ally at the Centre, the Indian National Lok Dal of the Haryana Chief Minister, Om Prakash Chautala is actively in the fray contesting from 50 seats. The Bahujan Samaj Party has put up 124 candidates and the Samajwadi Party, 63 nominees. The newly formed party, the Rajasthan Samajik Nyay Manch, has 64 nominees and alliances with 21 others but the party is battling for save its president's seat, Kolayat in Bikaner district.

The Left parties, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) and the and CPI, the CPI(ML) are also in the fray. The Janata Dal (Secular), the Rashtriya Lok Dal, the Parivartan Dal, the Sarvodaya Party of India and a whole lot of other parties are in the battle at the hustings in Rajasthan.

Keen contests are reported in the constituencies of many Ministers in the Gehlot Government including the Deputy Chief Ministers, Kamla (Bairath), Bhanwarilal Bairwa(Niwai), the Finance Minister, Pradhyumna Singh (Raja Kheda), the Home Minister, Gulab Singh Shaktawat (Vallabnagar), the Forest Minister, Bina Kak (Sumerpur) and the Labour Minister, Rajendra Choudhary (Bilara).

The former Chief Ministers, Heeralal Devpura (Kumbalgarh), Jagannath Pahadia (Weir) too are not yet out of the woods at the end of the campaign while Deputy Speaker of the Assembly, Devendra Singh is facing a tough fight from Subhash Behadia of the BJP in Bhilwara seat.

The Ministers, Ram Singh Vishnoi (Luni), Janardhan Singh Gehlot (Karauli), Jitendra Singh(Khetri), Radheyshyam (Sriganganagar) too are finding it difficult in their constituencies due to the presence of party rebels.

The sons of the senior Congress leaders, Braj Kishore Sharma (Jaipur rural), Jagat Singh (Lachmangarh), Mahipal Maderna (Bhopalgarh) too are not having any smooth sail.

Among the BJP leaders, the party's Chief Ministerial candidate, Vasundhara Raje Scindia is facing challenge from her Congress rival, Rama Pilot in Jalrapatan seat while the party bigwigs like Lalit Kishore Chaturvedi (Digod), Gulab Chand Kataria (Udaipur) and Nandlal Meena (Pratapgarh) are involved in keen contests. The former Deputy Chief Minister, Harishankar Bhabhra, is said to be ahead of his Congress rival in Rattangarh seat.

Former Minister, Gangaram Choudhary, who joined the BJP to fight from Chotan in Barmer district and Narpat Singh Rajvi, son-in-law of the Vice President, Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, who is contesting from Chittorgarh too are said to be battling hard against their Congress rivals.

Apart from the Congress and the BJP the parties with some hope of winning seats this time in Rajasthan are, the Janata Dal(U), INLD and the CPI(M), besides the Rajasthan Samajik Nyaya Manch.

The BSP is in the reckoning in one seat -- Jamwa Ramgarh -- while among the Independents, Surendra Vyas (Malpura), Kamla Meena (Sapotra), O.P.Yadav (Mandawar) and Harlal Singh Kharra (Srimadhopur) are seriously in the race. The rest of the Independents would only play spoilsport for either the BJP or the Congress.

The INLD candidates are said to be strong in Nadbai where the party has put up former MP and a member of the Bharatpur royal family, Krishnendra Kaur, in Deeg where her cousin, Arun Singh is fighting and in Hanumangarh district's Nohar and Badra.

The party candidate, Nasru Khan, is a serious contender for Lachmangarh seat from where Jagat Singh, son of the senior Congress leader, Natwar Singh is fighting.

The Congress may lose considerable number of seats in Bikaner division comprising the district of Bikaner, Sriganganagar and Hanumangarh due to the presence of large number of rebels.

The party which has 17 seats in the division against five of the BJP may lose half a dozen of its sitting seats. In the divisions of Kota, Udaipur and Ajmer the party position is weak in at least half a dozen of its holding seats while in the Jodhpur division the weak seats are four in number.

The Congress may fare badly also in at least 10 seats in Jaipur division which has a total of 58 seats but the gains would be more for others than the BJP.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Other States

News Update

Stories in this Section

Congress likely to lose some weight

CPI (M) hopeful of increasing its tally