Peeved over the alleged failure of the Vasundhara Raje government in getting them Scheduled Tribe status, an influential Gujjar organisation on Monday said that it would boycott the ruling BJP in the coming Rajasthan assembly elections. "The BJP government has not only ditched us but also broken its promises made to Gujjars, for recommending the Centre to accord ST status," said president of Rajasthan Gujjar Arakshan Sangarsh Samiti Kirorisingh Bainsla.
Rajasthan's chief minister Vasundhara Raje on Wednesday laid the foundation stone for setting up an IT/ITES SEZ by Somani Worsted Ltd and manufacturing facilities of Jaquar Ltd and Orient Craft Ltd in Bhiwadi. Digamber Singh, Rajasthan's minister of industries, was also present on the occasion.
The chief minister has recommended 4 to 6 per cent additional quota under nomadic cateogry to certain castes including Gurjars, and 10 to 20 per cent to Rajputs, Brahmins, and Vaishyas under EBC, BJP national treasurer Ramdas Agarwal, who is also the Chairman of Gurjar special package committee, told reporters after a party meeting.
The meeting is being held purportedly to discuss ways and means of raising the issues of Hinduism and the Ram Temple at Ayodhya in the coming weeks.
While Rajasthan BJP president Satish Poonia accused the Congress of being behind the demolition, state Congress chief Govind Singh Dotasra asserted that it was the decision of the city's municipality headed by the saffron party.
The chief ministers of five mineral-rich states on Wednesday urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for local value addition in the National Mineral Policy (NMP). They also argued that foreign firms must not be allowed to grab control of prized natural resources. The team consisted of Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik, Chhatishgarh CM Raman Singh, Jharkhand CM Madhu Koda, Madhya Pradesh CM Shivraj Singh Chauhan and Rajasthan's Vasundhara Raje.
It was alleged that Singh welcomed the guests by offering them opium diluted in water, a charge denied by him. A local resident Om Prakash Vishnoi, through his counsel Malam Singh Choudhary, filed the complaint before the special judge, Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act cases, under various sections of the law.
Bharatiya Janata Party leaders Sarbananda Sonowal, Jyotiraditya Scindia and Narayan Rane, all of whom are being seen as probables for induction as ministers in the Modi government, arrived in the national capital on Tuesday amid indications that the Union Council of Ministers is likely to be expanded on Wednesday.
Within days of the shocking blasts, Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje Scindia did something that none of the chief ministers of terror-hit states had done before.
The Rajasthan government on Thursday invited Gujjar community leader Kirori Singh Bainsla for talks, who said he would send his representatives after consulting prominent Gujjar leaders.
Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje's decision to stay away from the Bharatiya Janata Party national executive in New Delhi took away glamour from the meet. Newsmen who were looking for an opportunity to quiz her in the wake of her confrontation with the Gujjar leader Col Bhainsla were disappointed.
Accusing Raje of lacking 'courage of conviction', Bainsla said "it is the responsibility of the head of an elected government to come and listen to the grievances of the people." Contesting Raje's claim that she tried to contact him on Sunday from Bayana, the Gujjar leader said "no efforts were made from the CM's side to contact me".
In a virtual climb-down after defying the party's directive to step down as leader of Opposition in the Rajasthan assembly, senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader Vasundhara Raje on Friday said the orders of the leadership were 'supreme' for her."I am a disciplined soldier of the party and its order is supreme for me. I am committed to serve the party with a post or without it," she said. Raje was asked to resign in the wake of the party's poor performance.
The mahapanchayat comes less than a month after a violent agitation by the Gujjars, demanding ST status, rocked Rajasthan.
The PIL has alleged that large scale violence last month over the Gujjar's demand for inclusion in the Scheduled Tribe category was a fallout of the 'infighting' within the state Bharatiya Janata Party.
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Inflicting a shock defeat on BJP, the Congress today ousted the Vasundhara Raje government from power, emerging the single largest party with 96 seats falling short of a majority by just 5 seats.
Apart from the two major parties (Cong: 98; BJP: 67) the Bahujan Samaj Party is leading in four seats, while the Janata Dal-United and the Communist Party of India-Marxist are ahead in one each.
The Bharatiya Janata Party on Thursday hinted at "welcoming" former external affairs minister Natwar Singh into its fold after he quit the Congress.
Amid a plethora of Bharatiya Janata Party bigwigs, Manohar Lal Khattar and his council of ministers took the oath of office at Panchkula on Sunday.
The four-year-old Vasundhara Raje council of ministers in Rajasthan was on Monday expanded with induction of five ministers.
The Rajasthan government on Tuesday decided to forward the report of the Justice Jasraj Chopra Committee to the Centre. The committee had looked into the demands of the Gujjar community in the state, who want to be shifted to the Scheduled Caste category from the Other Backward Caste.
The 26-day-old agitation by Gujjars demanding Scheduled Tribe status is set to be called off on Wednesday as the community on Tuesday night reached an agreement with Rajasthan government in the final rounds of talks in Jaipur. The agreement will be signed on Wednesday by Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje and Gujjar leader Kirori Singh Bainsla, spearheading the stir, in Jaipur on Wednesday.
The decision to disrupt the House would be taken on a day to day basis, says Leader of Opposition in Rajya Sabha Ghulam Nabi Azad
Scores of wounded people were ferried to several hospitals soon after the low-intensity blasts hit at Tripolia Bazaar, where large number of devotees turned up at a Hanuman temple, Johari Bazaar, Manak Chowk, Badi Choupal and Choti Choupal in the walled part of the city. Police sources said the attack was meticulously planned and the first blast occurred around 1940 hours IST and the remaining blasts were set off in quick succession.
"In all the 24 deaths, the bullets hit the Gujjars on their back. This indicated that they were running for their lives and there was no question of someone resorting to violence."
Suspending Attar Singh Bhadana and Prahalad Gunjal, state BJP president Mahesh Sharma asked the duo to file their reply to the show cause notice-cum-suspension order within seven days, a party spokesman said.
Bainsla is expected to try and salvage the agreement, which has come under much fire from the Gujjars.
A three-member high-power committee headed by a retired High Court judge to examine the community's demand for ST status.
Congress said the BJP should ask Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje to step down as it can no longer "continue to defend the indefensible".
The state government wanted to sort out the matter but due to Friday's clash in Lalsot between Gujjars and Meenas, in which four persons were killed, the meeting was delayed.
For voters in this part of Rajasthan, it is water and farmers' issues which seem to be on the top of their minds as they ponder over whom to elect in the December 4 Assembly polls.
Former External Affairs Minister K Natwar Singh, who had to resign from the government in the wake of the Iraqi food-for-oil scam, on Wednesday announced his resignation from the Congress. Natwar made the announcement in the presence of Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje Scindia at a Bharatiya Janata Party-sponsored Jat rally in Vidyadhar Nagar. He also launched a blistering attack on Sonia Gandhi.
Former Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh Kalyan Singh was sworn-in as the 20th Governor of Rajasthan on Thursday. Chief Justice of Rajasthan high court Sunil Ambwani administered the oath of office to Singh at a ceremony held at Raj Bhawan.
Rajasthan Food and Supply Minister Kirorilal Meena on Wednesday refused to withdraw his resignation, which he had submitted to Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje last Sunday, on the Gujjar issue. Breaking his silence over the matter, Meena told a press conference in Jaipur that even if the chief minister requested him to take back his resignation, he would not do so.
The Rajasthan government recently made recitation of bhojan mantra in hostels compulsory.
The BJP said that the decision will not have any impact on the party's prospects in western Rajasthan.
She said the state government had written numerous letters to the Centre from time to time on the issue of deportation of Bangladeshi nationals who were finding their way into Rajasthan. "We wrote to them in June 2007 to say, look we need to do something about this. We got a reply back from them (Centre) saying, well why don't you just collect them and put them into a transit camp somewhere," Raje told 'Walk the Talk' programme on NDTV.
Criticising the Congress, he said the parties following the politics of family and dynasty may continue like that, but the BJP government was committed to taking the country's defence and self-respect to their pinnacle.
Speaking exclusively to rediff.com he said that the Gujjars did not fulfill any of the conditions that are necessary to get ST status.
Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje is participating in the negotiations for the first time.
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