Months before assembly polls in Rajasthan, the tussle between the topmost Congress leaders in the state has snowballed, with party leader Sachin Pilot opening a fresh line of attack on his rival, Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot. Pilot on Sunday announced that he will sit on a one-day fast against the incumbent government’s inaction on alleged corruption by the ersthile Vasundhara Raje-led government of the BJP.
Cracks within the Rajasthan’s Congress unit came to the fore on Sunday, as the 45-year-old leader demanded that the Gehlot government swiftly act against the alleged corruption of the BJP government led by Vasundhara Raje.
Pilot accused the Gehlot-led Congress government in the state saying that it had failed to act against the excise mafia, illegal mining, land encroachment or the Lalit Modi affidavit case.
“The Gehlot government did not take any action against corruption during the BJP rule in the state. The Congress had promised an investigation into the Rs 45,000 crore mines scam when we were in opposition,” he said at a press conference at his Jaipur home, while announcing his hunger strike at Shaheed Smarak on April 11.
Congress praises Gehlot government
However, Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh stressed on the significance of a unified Rajasthan unit and said the party will be seeking a mandate in the state later this year.
“The Congress Government in Rajasthan with Ashok Gehlot as CM has implemented a large number of schemes and taken many new initiatives that have impacted the people profoundly. This has given the state a leadership position in governance in our country,” Ramesh asserted.
Ramesh’s statement came following the hunger strike announcement by Pilot, that aims to put pressure on the Congress high command to solve problems before the end-of-year polls.
Will Rajasthan go the Punjab way?
According to party leaders and political analysts, the Congress is in a Catch-22 situation. They cannot go into the coming polls by ousting chief minister Gehlot, and imply that Gehlot was sitting on corruption cases during his tenure. The crisis can take a similar turn as was witnessed in Punjab, where the Congress lost miserably, they added.
Another analyst added that it is old guards Vs young, which is a core issue within the grand old party.
BJP takes potshots at Congress
Taking a jibe at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, BJP national spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla took to his official twitter handle and said, “After listening to Pilot Ek khyaal aaya. Rahul ji, First Gehlot & Pilot jodo. Then DK & Siddharamiah jodo. Then Maken & Sandeep Dikshit jodo. Sidhu & Raja Warring Jodo. Phir NCP ko phir se jodo. Bharat is already united but Congress is Tukde Tukde – Tooti Footi. Congress se janta jodo. Congress ko congress se jodo. Baki sab chodo.”
Gehlot and Pilot have been at war publicly for over years. In 2020, Pilot had led a rebellion, that threatened the stability of the 20-month-old Congress government in Rajasthan.
Crisis within BJP, too
However, not all is well within the BJP either with former BJP Chief Minister Raje facing competition from Union Jal Shakti Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat and state BJP chief Satish Poonia. It is learnt that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah would prefer Shekhawat as Rajasthan’s next CM if the party wins the assembly polls. This, despite the BJP losing when the party projected Shekhawat as the CM face the last time.
The Rajasthan BJP unit has also been told by central leaders that PM Modi is the biggest brand and face of the party, and they should not be concerned about the leadership issue in the state as that will be decided by the party high command.
AAP makes an entry
Pitching for an alternative in the state that has so far witnessed only binary politics, the Aam Aadmi Party feels it will benefit from this infighting within the two parties.
Launching the AAP’s election campaign in the state in March, Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal at a Tiranga Yatra in Jaipur offered the people of the state the development models of Delhi and Punjab. “Both BJP and Congress are fighting with their own people for power. They’re not fighting for the people of the state. They’re fighting for the CM chair. I have heard that ex-CM Raje and CM are very good friends. When Gehlot comes under fire, Raje puts forward the entire BJP for him. There was talk of Raje being removed and Ashok Gehlot put the entire Congress in her defence. So, these are not different parties. It is one and the same party — Vasundhara Raje Ashok Gehlot party.”
Punjab CM Bhawant Mann, who joined the roadshow, said that God has sent a broom to clean the Congress and BJP in Rajasthan. “Now the third option has come in Rajasthan.”
Earlier, AAP announced that it will contest the assembly election on all the seats in Rajasthan.
In 2018, the party fielded candidates on 142 out of 200 seats and managed to win only 0.4 percent votes.
Elections in Rajasthan are due in December this year.