The RSS which catapulted Jagdeep Dhankar to national prominence after 21 years of hibernation could not come to his rescue when BJP higher ups decided to seek his resignation, points out Prakash Bhandari.
Sources in the Raje camp said she would be meeting the party high command on Thursday.
If Meena resigns, it is likely to put pressure on other ministers whose areas also saw poor performance in the general elections.
On the eve of the counting of votes in Rajasthan, both the Bharatiya Janata Party and the Congress have started reaching out to independent candidates, including rebels, and smaller parties.
Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and other senior party leaders, including All India Congress Committee general secretary Avinash Pande and spokesperson Randeep Surjewala, also moved to Jaisalmer along with the MLAs in five chartered flights.
Former Rajasthan minister Rajendra Singh Gudha claimed that Congress leaders dragged him out of the state assembly on Monday.
While the Congress has cited alleged poaching attempt as a reason for keeping their MLAs in the hotel, the BJP said they moved theirs to train them on the Rajya Sabha poll process.
The Congress on Tuesday suffered a major upset in Himachal Pradesh at the hands of the Bharatiya Janata Party in the Rajya Sabha elections which were marred by cross-voting in all the three states though it won three seats in Karnataka while the saffron party pocketed an extra seat in Uttar Pradesh.
The newly elected Bharatiya Janata Party MLAs in Rajasthan will meet in Jaipur on Tuesday to formally pick the next chief minister of the state, ending days of suspense after the party won the assembly elections.
Gehlot's remark hinted at a possible thaw between the two senior Congress leaders after years of political tussle.
First-time MLA Rekha Gupta will be the new chief minister of Delhi, capping 11 days of suspense over who will get the top post after the Bharatiya Janata Party returned to power after over 26 years ending the 10-year rule of the Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party.
Amid high political drama over leadership change in Rajasthan, the Opposition Bharatiya Janata Party on Sunday hinted at imposition of President's rule in the state.
Never before has the BJP faced such a crisis over the nomination of the Chief Minister as it is facing now, discovers Prakash Bhandari, veteran observer of Rajasthan politics.
Rajasthan Chief Minister Bhajanlal Sharma, state BJP president C P Joshi and Union minister Bhupendra Yadav welcomed them into the party at its state headquarters in Jaipur.
With the announcement of list of candidates for the December 1 assembly elections, rebellion is out in the open among Bharatiya Janata Party rank and file in Rajasthan's Hadoti region, once a stronghold of the opposition party.
Of the 34 SC reserved seats that went to the polls, the BJP won 22 and the Congress 11.
There is a rise in the number of women elected to the state legislatures in 2023 compared to 2018, except in Rajasthan.
The Bharatiya Janata Party returned to power in Rajasthan on Sunday, winning 115 seats out of the 199 where assembly elections were held last week.
Former deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot, who has been involved in a leadership tussle with Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, skipped his interaction.
The party has already denied tickets to 14 of the 49 legislators who had won last time.
Gehlot exuded confidence that all the three candidates of the Congerss will comfortably win.
The shifting of MLAs to Congress-ruled Rajasthan will allow the party to focus on drawing up its strategy for the crucial Rajya Sabha elections for which it has fielded two candidates, the source said.
At its Jaipur meeting, the BJP will focus on this year's assembly elections in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh while the Congress's Chintan Shivir in Udaipur will discuss how it can resurrect itself.
The ruling Communist Party of India-Marxist on Monday took a veiled dig at the Congress by asking it to safeguard its newly elected Karnataka MLAs from being poached by the Bharatiya Janata Party as was allegedly done by the saffron party in Goa amidst the Bharat Jodo Yatra.
While the two MLAs will abstain in the event of a trust vote in the assembly, it is, however, not a withdrawal of support.
The BJP's victory in the Delhi Assembly elections has sparked speculation over who will lead the next government. Several prominent leaders, including Pravesh Verma, Ashish Sood, Pawan Sharma, Vijender Gupta, and Satish Upadhyay, are in the running for the chief minister's post. The party's national leadership is expected to make the final decision, leaving the contenders in a state of anticipation.
Chhattisgarh scores the highest among all four states with 21 per cent of its newly elected lawmakers women.
"The news of signature by 120 MLAs (in her support) is completely wrong. It is not fair to link a public hearing with a different view," the CMO said.
The Central Bureau of Investigation has filed a supplementary charge-sheet against 17 persons including a Congress Member of Legislative Assembly and a Bharatiya Janata Party MLA in connection with the communal violence in Gopalgarh in 2009 which claimed ten lives.
The Congress also has the support of 10 out of 13 independents, and other party MLAs like Rashtriya Lok Dal (1), which is its ally.
The list also includes the names of Mumbai BJP president Ashish Selar, fielded from the Vandre West seat, and senior party leader and Lok Sabha MP Narayan Rane's son Nitesh Rane, fielded from Kankavli, a seat he currently represents in the assembly.
Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot has alleged that the BJP was conspiring to poach the MLAs in order to destabilise his government, a charge denied by the saffron party.
'The BSP does not agree with the policies of the Congress and the BJP, and therefore opposes their candidates. The party has issued a whip directing the MLAs to vote for the Independent candidate'
The BJP had on Monday demanded the resignation of Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot on moral grounds after his government said in a reply to a question in the state A assembly that it taps phones in the interest of public safety and order.
Claiming a heavy transfer of cash to Jaipur, Gehlot said there were reports about the BJP's plan similar to that of Madhya Pradesh and some of the party MLAs were offered Rs 25 crore in cash with Rs 10 crore in advance.
The MLAs inducted into the Rajasthan cabinet are Meena, Madan Dilawar, Rathore, Gajendra Singh Khimsar, Babulal Kharadi, Jogaram Patel, Suresh Singh Rawat, Avinash Gehlot, Joraram Kumawat, Hemant Meena, Kanhaiya Lal Choudhary and Sumit Godara.
The Ashok Gehlot camp has been saying that they enjoyed the support of 109 MLAs, a claim contested by the Pilot loyalists. In the run-up to the Congress Legislature Party meeting in Jaipur on Tuesday, Pilot loyalist Ramesh Meena said, "A floor test should be conducted in the assembly. This will expose the claim that the Ashok Gehlot government has the support of 109 MLAs."
Rajya Sabha MP Subhash Chandra on Tuesday filed his nomination from Rajasthan for the elections to the Upper House of Parliament as an Independent backed by the Bharatiya Janata Party.
A day after the Bharatiya Janata Party scored big wins in three assembly polls, talk within the party shifted to the likely chief ministerial picks in these states, with senior leaders holding discussions on Monday.
Meena, however, refused to elaborate on the incident, which is seen as an attempt at 'badabandi' -- holing up elected leaders in resorts as a show of strength.
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