Why It Comes To Sachin Pilot To Retain Congress Seats In Rajasthan By-Polls

Rajasthan is set to have by-polls for five assembly seats soon. While all of these seats were won by INDI Alliance parties in 2023, the duty to retain three of them for Congress lies solely on former deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot.

This is because the three seats of Dausa, Jhunjhunu and Deoli-Uniyara were held by those Congress MLAs that are considered close to Pilot and won the Lok Sabha election as Pilot campaigned for them extensively.

Two-time Dausa MLA Murari Lal Meena won the Lok Sabha election from Dausa, four-time Jhunjhunu MLA Brijendra Singh Ola won from Jhunjhunu and two-time Deoli-Uniara MLA Harish Meena won from Tonk-Sawai Madhopur.

The remaining two seats set for by-polls are Khinvsar and Chorasi, which the Congress is likely to let its allies Rashtriya Loktantrik Party (RLP) and Bharat Adivasi Party (BAP) contest respectively as they were vacated by them.

Dausa Lok Sabha seat is a family seat of Sachin Pilot, he won here in 2004. Prior to that, his father Rajesh Pilot won multiple times here and his mother Rama Pilot won in 2000 by-polls after his father's demise.

Pilot pioneered Murari Lal Meena's name for the ticket this time. In 2019, the ticket was given to his wife Savita Meena, as Pilot supported her. While she could not win at that time, her husband broke the BJP's winning streak this time.

Now, it's Pilot's responsibility to retain the assembly seat for Congress. He might choose Murari Lal's wife again or another candidate, but the Gujjar population in the district will be favourable for him.

Similarly, Deoli-Uniara is another constituency where Gujjars and Meenas dominate the electorate. Moreover, the constituency borders with Pilot's Tonk constituency, giving him considerable influence here.

While Harish Meena joined Congress only in 2018 after leaving the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), he became a close confidant of Pilot soon. In 2020, he was among the rebel MLAs that supported Pilot.

Thus, it now comes to Pilot to retain this constituency for the Congress, which Harish Meena won twice. However, the greater responsibility is in Jhunjhunu where the party has not lost since 2008.

But here, instead of Pilot, Brijendra Ola has to carry the party as the constituency is Jat-dominated and Ola, being a Jat, has won from here four times. A Jat is likely to get the Congress ticket from here.

In Khinvsar, the RLP is likely to field the party chief Hanuman Beniwal's brother Narayan. Hanuman won the Lok Sabha election from Nagaur. When he won Lok Sabha election in 2019, his brother contested the by-polls. The same is likely to happen this time as well.

However, Congress' other ally BAP seems to be undecided over the candidate as the party supremo Rajkumar Roat won the Lok Sabha election from Banswara, vacating the Chorasi assembly seat.

But retaining the three Congress seats is a litmus test for Sachin Pilot, who aspires to become chief minister of the state. Former chief minister Ashok Gehlot has become less active since the 2023 assembly election loss.

Even in the Lok Sabha elections, he was seen campaigning majorly for his son Vaibhav in the Jalore constituency. After the elections in Rajasthan got over, he camped in Amethi as senior Congress observer.

Gehlot has been the main challenger to Pilot. But if he retires from active politics due to his age, a political void will be created and to fill in that, Pilot will have to prove his worth.