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Journalism of Courage
With about four months to go for the Rajasthan Assembly elections, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Thursday announced two key poll panels – the manifesto and election management committees – with former chief minister Vasundhara Raje not included in both of them.
While Union Minister Arjun Ram Meghwal has been named the convener of the 25-member Sankalp Patra or manifesto committee, former MP Narayan Panchariya has been appointed as the head of the election management committee, which has 21 members.
After the BJP declared these panels, Raje started trending on social media owing to her exclusion from them. However, neither of them has those faces too, who along with Raje are among the CM aspirants in the event of the BJP coming to power: Union Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the state Assembly Rajendra Rathore, and former state president Satish Poonia, among others.
BJP sources claimed that the drafting of the manifesto involves “scholarly work” and hence, Meghwal, Union Minister of Law and Justice (independent charge), is “best suited” for it. This committee includes Rajya Sabha MPs, Ghanshyam Tiwari and Kirodi Lal Meena, and former Deputy Speaker Rao Rajendra Singh as co-conveners.
The co-conveners of the BJP election management panel include former state general secretary Onkar Singh Lakhawat, a party veteran, and MP and ex-Union minister Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore. “This committee will mainly be tasked with managing election rallies, arranging tents, chairs, food, etc. So of course, it isn’t at par with the stature of a former CM or a former state president, hence their exclusion,” a party source said.
Another BJP leader said that these panels have been declared by state party president C P Joshi and not by the central party leadership. “Apart from some names to get the designated tasks done, some other names have been included mainly to accommodate them or to balance caste equations,” the leader claimed.
Asked about Raje’s name missing from these panels, the BJP’s Rajasthan in-charge and Rajya Sabha MP Arun Singh indicated that she was perhaps not suited for it on account of her stature and that she will instead campaign in the polls.
“The election management committee has day-to-day work and has to sit here (at the party office), there are many experienced people in it. She (Raje) also has a role, you don’t have to worry. She is the party’s national vice president, two-term chief minister, and has a big role. Woh zabardast prachar karengi (she will undertake a massive campaign), all of us respect her,” Singh said.
