Lok Sabha polls: 48 years after a ‘maharani’, Jaipur’s first woman candidate hopes to make a mark in BJP bastion

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Five months later, the tables have turned. Khandelwal is the Congress’s candidate for the Jaipur Lok Sabha seat. Her candidature is the first instance in 48 years when a national party has fielded a woman candidate from the seat, which has around 20 lakh voters.

“Yeh bahut badi baat hai ki adthalis saal ke baad kisi mahila ko mauka mila. Lekin mujhe ye bhi lagta hai ki koi meri akele ki jeet nahi hogi. Yeh bahut sari mahilayon, betiyon ko agey badhne ke liye rasta kholne wali jeet hogi (It’s a very big thing that after 48 years a woman has got the chance. But I think that this will not only be my victory. This will open the channels of growth for women and daughters),” says Khandelwal while campaigning in Jobner Bagh in Jaipur.

Pitted against incumbent BJP MP Ramcharan Bohra, if Khandelwal wins, she will be the first woman after late Gayatri Devi to win the seat. In 2014, Bohra had defeated Congress’s Mahesh Joshi by over 5 lakh votes.

Devi, the wife of Jaipur royal Late Maharaja Sawai Man Singh II, represented Jaipur between 1962 and 1977, and was elected to parliament thrice from the seat. Her win in 1962 entered the Guinness World Records for the biggest election victory after she won 1,92,909 of 2,46, 516 votes cast. In 1971, Devi was the last woman to win the seat. Since then, no national party has fielded a woman candidate from Jaipur.

Almost half a century after Devi’s win, the 44-year-old Khandelwal faces the uphill task of winning a seat which is known as a BJP bastion and has been won by the Congress only once in the last thirty years, when Mahesh Joshi emerged victorious in 2009.

In her campaign speeches, Khandelwal, who served as mayor between 2009 and 2014, appeals for votes as ‘Jaipur ki beti, Jaipur ki bahu’ to counter sitting MP Bohra, the BJP’s rhetoric of nationalism and the charisma of PM Modi.

“It was my fortune to work for you as mayor. I have always worked as a Jaipur ki beti, Jaipur ki bahu. The city has given me love and respect and I have fought for you. Whenever someone needed me in their grief or happiness, I have been there. Therefore, I am asking from you what is my hak (right) — that is your vote. Your vote and support will help me and women to get ahead,” says Khandelwal in a public interaction.

The Jaipur Lok Sabha constituency, which has eight Assembly segments (Hawa Mahal, Vidhyadhar Nagar, Civil Lines, Kishanpole, Adarsh Nagar, Malviya Nagar, Sanganer and Bagru), has become a prestige issue for the Congress as the party won five of the seats in 2018 Assembly elections.

By fielding Khandelwal, a member of the Mahajan caste, a thriving business community known to traditionally support the BJP, the Congress hopes to make a dent in the saffron party’s core vote bank.

“If we manage to take away even 50,000 votes of the business class who have traditionally voted for the BJP till now in every Assembly segment, we can hope to gain significantly,” says a senior Congress leader who did not wish to be named.

On the other hand, Bohra, a Brahmin, is part of the community which has given the maximum number of MPs to Jaipur. The late Girdhari Lal Bhargava, another Brahmin BJP leader who was elected Jaipur MP six times between 1989 and 2009, remained undefeated until his death. Brahmins, Vaishyas and Muslims are the three biggest social groups in the constituency.

Bohra starts his campaign speeches by urging people to chant ‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’ before talking about the importance of the Lok Sabha polls.

“We have seen and fought many elections but this one is different. This election is being fought on the basis of patriotism by one side, and on the other side are the Opposition parties who want to divide the nation,” says Bohra at a rally in Bagru.

Bohra counts the resolution of Doklam standoff and the airstrikes in Balakot after the Pulwama attack among the major achievements of the Prime Minister.

For the Congress to pull off a victory in this BJP bastion, it has to begin by checking factionalism in its ranks.

Before the 2018 Assembly elections, Khandelwal was not on good terms with several leaders, including Amin Kagzi and Mahesh Joshi, who were given tickets by the party and won from Assembly seats from where Khandelwal was herself vying for tickets.

“Khandelwal now needs to secure the support of these MLAs… Although Khandelwal and the two legislators are now presenting a united front in public and appealing to workers to forget the past differences, it will be clear only after the results whether the leaders have left the infighting behind,” says a Congress leader.