Meena, Gurjar equations carry Congress through East Rajasthan

The 54-year-old BJP leader from Rajasthan, fighting his first general election after serving as a party office-bearer for over two decades, garnered 6,31,992 votes (50.42 per cent), while Lalit Yadav got 5,83,710 votes.

The Alwar seat, treated as a prestige battle by both the BJP and the Congress, saw the BJP win three times and the Congress 10 times in the past.

Gurjar and Meena are the dominant caste in the eastern Rajasthan districts who have voted for Congress. A major reason for the tilt towards Congress was said to be the point of changing the Constitution and removing reservation. A few BJP leaders had claimed that if they crossed 400, BJP would amend the Constitution. The Congress played up this issue that BJP wants to remove reservation and that impacted the voting pattern here.

Moreover, Sachin Pilot too played a major role in getting these seats for the Congress. Murarilal Meena from Dausa, Harish Chandra Meena from Tonk-Sawai Madhopur, Sanjana Jatav from Bharatpur are Pilot’s supporters. Being a Gurjar, Pilot was able to woo the Gurjar voters. Tonk is already the Assembly constituency for Pilot while Dausa is his former constituency where his father won elections.

Ironically, the current CM Bhajan Lal Sharma who belongs to Bharatpur district was not able to save the seat for BJP. Congress has been pointing fingers at the CM since it became clear that it was winning the seat.

Congress candidate Bhajanlal Jatav won the Karauli-Dholpur Lok Sabha seat. He defeated BJP’s Indu Devi Jatav by over 98,000 votes. Staring at her defeat, as she sensed during the counting of votes, Indu Devi left the counting midway and went home.

In Dausa, Congress candidate Murarilal Meena defeated BJP candidate Kanhaiyalal Meena by over 2,37,000 votes. Murarilal polled 6,46,266 votes while Kanhaiyalal got 4,08,926 votes. Sonu Dhanka of Bahujan Samaj Party came third.

Cabinet minister Kirodi Lal Meena, had earlier announced that if BJP does not win the Dausa seat he would resign from the post of minister. As it became clear that BJP was losing Dausa, the Rajasthan Congress from its Twitter handle asked Meena to go ahead and keep his promise.

Responding to the tweet, Meena responded on X: Raghukul reet sada chali aayi, pran jaaye par vachan na jaaye thereby hinting that he would quit soon.

In the evening, the EVM malfunctioned in Dausa after which votes were counted through VVPAT. At 5.15 pm, Murarilal Meena was declared the winner.

Taking a dig at CM Sharma, state PCC chief Govind Singh Dotasra tweeted that Sharma should also resign from his post taking responsibility for BJP’s loss in his home district Bharatpur. Sharma has not responded to the tweet.

Congress candidate from Bharatpur Lok Sabha seat Sanjana Jatav defeated Ram Swaroop Koli. According to sources, even Congress itself had not expected Sanjana and Bhajan Lal Jatav to win their seats.

Congress candidate Harishchandra Meena won the Tonk-Sawai Madhopur Lok Sabha seat by defeating BJP candidate and two-time MP Sukhbir Singh Jaunapuria by 64,949 votes. With this defeat, Jaunapuria missed a hat-trick of victory. Harishchandra Meena got 6,23,763 votes in the election.

The SC and ST reserve seats of eastern Rajasthan have shown that a single comment during elections can cost a party heavily.