Jaipur, April 9 (IANS): Has the Congress been trapped by its own Hand? This is the question being asked across political circles in Rajasthan after the Congress was left red-faced with its candidates from Basnwara Dungarpur disappearing after the party announced an alliance with the Bharat Adivasi Party (BAP).
Two of the Congress candidates including Arvind Damor who was contesting the Lok Sabha seat of Banswara Dungarpur and Kapoor Singh who was contesting for Bagidora Assembly bypolls switched off their phones and vanished when they had to withdraw their nominations on Monday, as per the party's announcement of an alliance with the BAP on Sunday.
Party sources said the Banswara story emerged as a ripple effect of new political equations in the Jalore-Sirohi seat.
Former Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot's son Vaibhav Gehlot is contesting from the Jalore Sirohi seat as a Congress candidate.
Besides the Congress, the BSP and the BAP have also fielded their candidates for this seat. The BJP’s grassroots candidate Lumbaram Chaudhary is also in the fray.
While the BSP candidate Lal Singh withdrew his nomination on Monday and announced his support for the Congress, party sources said that BAP candidate Bhimraj Bhati was also asked by Congress workers to withdraw his nomination on Monday.
As per the plans of the Congress, it was decided that the BAP candidate from Jalore Sirohi Bhimraj Bhati will also withdraw his nomination from this seat and will support Vaibhav here. However, on Monday, he also went underground and switched off his phone. Manju Meghwal, looking after the election management, kept calling him but he did not respond. Party sources said that the Banswara story emerged as a reaction to this action of the Congress in which the BAP candidate was asked to withdraw his nomination so that Vaibhav could benefit and his votes would not go to other parties.
Meanwhile, Banswara candidate Arvind Damor said that he has been insulted by being fielded and then being asked to withdraw and so he has decided to contest the elections. Another candidate Kapoor Singh said, “Withdrawal of name might have spoiled my career. So I decided to contest the polls.”
Congress workers told IANS that the local party workers here are upset over the candidature of Vaibhav from this seat and are terming him an outsider. They are not interested in campaigning for him and hence came up with the story of an alliance with the BAP to ensure an easy contest for Vaibhav. However, many party workers are against this alliance both in the Congress and the BAP and it took a lot of time to finalise the deal.
The Banswara Dungarpur Lok Sabha seat was won by the BJP in 2014 and 2019. In the last polls, the BJP got over 7.11 lakh votes. The Congress got 4.06 lakh votes while the BAP secured over 2 lakh votes. The BJP had won the seat by a margin of over three lakh votes but if the Congress and the BAP had come together the contest may have been a bit close.
Even in the recent assembly polls, the Congress got 5 seats and the BAP got 1 seat. So a BAP-Congress alliance would have challenged the BJP. However, now a Congress candidate has been fielded here and a BAP candidate is being fielded for the Jalore Sirohi seat. This has spoiled the Congress’ game plan in both the seats.
Former Rajya Sabha MP and veteran BJP leader Narayan Panchariya told IANS, “No matter what the Congress does, we are confident of scoring a hat-trick in these elections. In the Banswara seat, we will have a hat trick as the voters have full trust in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s guarantee.”
BJP senior leader Pramod Vasishtha said, “It’s a 'raja-runk' kind of battle in Jalore Sirohi with the CM's son Vaibhav Gehlot fielded against our candidate Chaudhary who drives a two-wheeler and campaigns in his two pairs of clothes. We will win this seat too.”