BJP chief ministerial candidate for Rajasthan Vasundhara Raje will contest from the Jhalrapatan constituency, sources said here today after a meeting of the party’s Central Election Committee (CEC).The Assembly segment falls in Raje’s Lok Sabha constituency of Jhalawar. Former Deputy chief minister Hari Shankar Bhabhra, who lost the last election by a narrow margin, has been given a ticket again from Ratangarh. Sumitra Singh, a sitting Independent member of the Assembly and former Congress leader, has been fielded from Jhunjhunu. The CEC finalised names of candidates for 96 of the 200 seats, re-nominating all sitting MLAs. The list has been held up since some senior leaders have asked for a change of constituency. Four important leaders — Lalit Kishore Chaturvedi, Kirori Lal Meena, Ghanshyam Tewari and Narpat Singh Rajvi — want change out of the fear of losing from their traditional seats. The high command, which has allowed people to shift constituencies in Madhya Pradesh, is not allowing the same in Rajasthan.Sources say the norm has been imposed at the behest of Vice-President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat. Rajvi, Shekhawat’s son-in-law, wanted to shift from Chittorgarh district to Amber on the outskirts of Jaipur. A former MLA, he found his path blocked by Navin Pilania, son of Jat Mahasabha president G.P. Pilania. Since elder Pilania’s support was crucial to Raje’s electoral prospects, she felt called upon to accommodate Navin. Shekhawat, seeing Pilania come in the way of his son-in-law, reportedly suggested that nobody shift his seat. This would ensure that all his detractors — Chaturvedi, Tewari and Meena — have a chance of being defeated. Chaturvedi and Tewari had lost the last polls by heavy margins.Senior state BJP leaders were closeted at Raje’s house till late at night to sort out the issue. Another problem confronting them was the high command directive that at least one woman candidate be fielded in every Lok Sabha constituency. This may lead to the nomination of wives, daughters and daughters-in-law of some potential candidates.Meanwhile, differences between Union Minister Sumitra Mahajan and MP chief ministerial candidate Uma Bharti continued to hold up the names of nominees for four of the five Assembly seats of Indore. The only name cleared for a city seat, Indore-two, was of local Mayor and sitting MLA Kailash Vijayvarghiya, an opponent of Mahajan.The CEC put its seal on 32 names for MP today, taking the total number of candidates named so far to 171. They include RSS pracharak Raghavji (Shamsabad) and five women, four of them sitting MLAs.
