The Bharatiya Janata Party's tally in Rajya Sabha has dipped below 90 for the first time in several years but the party and its allies are expected to not only recoup the their losses but also make some gains when by-elections to fill the existing vacancies are held in the coming weeks.
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.
After Punjab, the party high command has shifted its focus to Rajasthan, where demands for Cabinet expansion and political appointments gained momentum after reports of resentment in the camp led by former deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot, who along with 18 MLAs had rebelled against the leadership of Gehlot last year.
Congress leader Sachin Pilot on Thursday expressed happiness that the Congress party has taken cognisance of the issues raised by him about welfare of youth and corruption under the previous Vasundhara Raje government in Rajasthan, and asserted the party will contest the assembly polls unitedly to secure a massive victory.
Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot loyalist and state cabinet Minister Pratap Khachariyawas on Monday said that the Congress workers are attempting to save their party and have to be prepared to "spill blood on the roads" against the Bharatiya Janata Party which, he alleged, wants to "topple" the state government.
'There is ample evidence to suggest that attacks on the PM's probity and his connections with business houses do not resonate with voters.'
The Congress leadership is caught in a peculiar situation and wants to find a middle path to the issue, party sources said.
How C P Joshi is scuttling the Rajasthan chief minister's bid to retain office. Illustration: Uttam Ghosh
Sources said the leadership of the government going forward, if Gehlot is elected as party chief, is likely to be on the meeting agenda.
The Congress is now gearing up to take on the BJP over alleged corruption, jobs and issues tied to tribals, farmers and women.
The move by Pilot to open a new front against Gehlot amid the factional fighting is seen as an attempt to pressure the party high command to resolve the leadership issue ahead of the year-end polls.
Azad said the government uses north-east 'only for political purposes' and not to provide succour to flood-affected people.
Names of senior party leaders Kharge, Kamal Nath, Digvijaya Singh, Sushilkumar Shinde, Mukul Wasnik and Kumari Selja are now also doing the rounds for the post.
With the deepening political crisis in Rajasthan over the appointment of Ashok Gehlot's successor, Congress Working Committee members have demanded from Sonia Gandhi to pull the state chief minister out of the race for the party chief and select another candidate for the top post, sources said on Monday.
In India elections are never fought in a straight line. It's fought on many issues, at many levels, with multiple emotions and with a bit of good luck, too. Sheela Bhatt reports from Rajasthan.
Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, she said, had openly violated the Anti-Defection law and cheated the BSP for a second time by getting its MLAs included in the Congress.
"Where did we make any statement against the party? We wanted to draw the attention of the party high-command to the fact that we were not able to deliver on things promised in the manifesto for which the public elected us," Vishvendra Singh said in a video message.
Senior leader P Chidambaram whose Rajya Sabha tenure is ending from Maharashtra is under consideration from Tamil Nadu as the Congress is all set to get the support of alliance partner the DMK. The G-23 leaders, including Ghulam Nabi Azad, Anand Sharma and Vivek Tankha, are also said to be in contention.
Agnihotri will be in charge of Jal Shakti, transport, and language, arts and culture departments while Chief Minister Sukhu has kept with himself finance, general administration, home, planning, personnel and other portfolios which have not been allotted to any minister, the notification stated on Tuesday.
The chief whip, who moved the top court two days after the assembly speaker C P Joshi filed the appeal against the July 24 Rajasthan high court order, was very critical of the judicial intervention into the disqualification proceedings and said that the order 'was ex facie unconstitutional' and amounted to an intrusion into the domain of speaker's power under the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution.
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.
If the six MLAs voted against the party whip, they were liable for disqualification from the assembly.
Rathore, however, said he was a "true soldier" of the Congress party and it was in the public domain who had damaged the party.
While withdrawing the plea, Sibal told the bench that the appeal had become infructuous as the apex court did not stay the earlier high court order passed on July 21 asking the Speaker to defer disqualification proceedings.
A day after a group of Congress MLAs met Sachin Pilot, another party legislator on Friday expressed support for the dissident leader as trouble brewed again in Rajasthan's ruling party.
'Prime Minister Narendra Modi should have called his MLAs and ministers and said 'this should not happen in India. Manipur is not a part of any banana republic, I will not allow this to happen, talk it out, what is the problem'
In a day of frantic developments, Digvijaya Singh entered the fray for the Congress president's election as Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot opted out of the race and the suspense over his continuation at the helm in the state deepened with the party saying it would be decided in a day or two.
A day after Congress leader Rahul Gandhi said both Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and his former deputy Sachin Pilot were "assets to the party", the CM on Tuesday suggested that the matter rests there.
Pilot had claimed that the Ashok Gehlot government was in minority and more than 30 Congress and some independent legislators have pledged support to him.
With the Rajasthan cabinet reshuffle scheduled for later in the day, Congress leader Sachin Pilot on Sunday expressed his satisfaction over the move and stated that the inclusion of four Dalit ministers in the cabinet has sent out a positive message about the party and the state government.
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.
'Nobody understands Gehlot's politics.' 'The Congress high command should wake up.'
Two other Rajasthan ministers Vishvendra Singh and Ramesh Meena were also sacked from the state cabinet after a meeting of the Congress Legislature Party, its second in the last two days. The meeting was billed as a 'second chance' for Pilot, who had turned down appeals from the party's top leadership -- including Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi -- to return to the fold.
Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Wednesday filed her nomination papers in Jaipur for the upcoming Rajya Sabha polls from Rajasthan.
A Pilot camp MLA said that the former deputy chief minister is raising the issue of corruption in the public interest.
'These are lies that Priyanka Gandhi rung up Sachin Pilot.'
The assembly session comes days after the top leadership of the Congress announced the return of Pilot and 18 other dissident MLAs to the party-fold. Referring to Pilot's open rebellion while addressing the legislators, the CM asked them to 'forget what has happened'.
Pilot was spied on after revolt, says Gehlot's OSD
As he said this, he set the target of winning 156 seats in the assembly election due later this year.
"I have seen Pilot's statement in the media that he will not join the BJP. If you do not want to go to the BJP, stop accepting the hospitality of the BJP immediately," Congress general secretary Randeep Surjewala said.
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