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New comer fights a lone battle for Congress

By Sunny Sebastian

PALI, APRIL 29. Internal squabbles, which had a catastrophic effect on Congress prospects in the recent Rajasthan Assembly elections, continue to plague the party in the Pali Lok Sabha constituency where the much moneyed from the big cities like Mumbai and Ahmedabad have been determining the poll outcome of late.

As it is elsewhere in Rajasthan, the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party are the main contenders in the elections but there are as many as three candidates with Congress background in the fray against the outgoing MP, Pushp Jain of the BJP.

The Congress' official nominee, Surendra Surana, is seemingly fighting a lone battle in the constituency as many of the senior party men nurse a grudge against Mr. Surana, the latest entrant from Mumbai's business world into the murky and factional politics of Pali.

Things have been made somewhat easy for Mr. Jain, whom the party was initially planning to replace after adverse reports against his prospects in the constituency. The battle is now among Jains of various hues in the constituency which has been allocated to the Jain community by the BJP, the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party.

Meetha Lal Jain, the NCP nominee, who entered the electoral politics in Pali over a decade ago, first fighting against the present Vice-President of India, Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, in Bali Assembly segment on the Congress ticket, too is a rich businessman. Pali is one of the few seats the NCP had sought from the Congress in vain under the alliance. Apparently the lone serious non-Jain candidate, former Minister and Congress rebel, Madho Singh Dewan, is now making an attempt to whip up non-Jain sentiments in the constituency, which is known for its enterprising Marwari businessmen who have made it good elsewhere in the country.

"Being a Jain is no crime. The community has contributed immensely to the well-being of the people of Pali,'' notes Pushp Jain, who banks on the work he has done in the constituency during the past five years with his MP's area development fund.

The seat has been represented in the past by more illustrious Jains like L. M. Singhvi, India's former High Commissioner to Britain and now a BJP member of the Rajya Sabha, and Guman Mal Lodha, a former Chief Justice of the Guwahati High Court.

Mr.Dewan, who unsuccessfully led a campaign against the party allocating the seat to Mr.Surana, a first-timer in politics who has his hotel business in Mumbai, is the spiritual head of the over 2-lakh strong Sirvi community in the area. The Congress candidate finds solace in the fact that Sirvis are traditional voters of the BJP -- that was when Mr.Dewan was not around.

Nemesis has caught up with Mr.Surana in the form of non-cooperation from the Congress candidates in the recent Assembly polls behind whose defeat he reportedly had a hand. Though Mr.Surana stoutly denies this, the defeat of six out of the eight Congress nominees -- all by small margins --from the Assembly segments falling in the Pali Lok Sabha seat have been attributed to the presence of party rebels, reportedly propped up by Mr.Surana.

Now if Bina Kak, former Rajasthan Forest Minister, is sitting away in Jaipur and not campaigning for the official Congress nominee in her former constituency Sumerpur, and if Bheemraj Bhati, who lost from Pali, is with Mr.Dewan that is mostly because of the antecedence of Mr.Surana, who was not even a member of the Congress party till two months ago.

"The Congress did not have a Jain candidate with winning chances so I was offered a ticket from here,'' Mr.Surana, who enjoys the goodwill of the public for the relief work he had initiated in the area during the past 5 years of drought. "I will win with a huge margin,'' Mr.Surana says.

Mr.Surana is heading several institutions of Jain Terapanth in the country and expects that to make him the rightful representative of Jains in the Lower House of Parliament.

The perennially drought-prone district, known for its henna, spices and cattle wealth besides its entrepreneurs, seeks water and more job opportunities. Gangaram Garasia, a tribal in Nana village of Sumerpur, complains of no relief work in his area unlike the previous year. Gangaram and his friend Rajesh, of course, do not realize that the State Government has not declared any part of Rajasthan drought-affected this year.

Both the cattle and people migrate annually to the greener pastures, while it is the politicians who make hay back home. But in a way elections are a cropping season for the people here as more than party politics it is the resourcefulness of individual candidates that determines the winner.

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