Former rulers in battle with commoners

Rajasthan Royals

Indrajit Singh | Rajasthan | 30 March 2009 |

The dusty battle ground of electoral politics will witness some of the erstwhile rulers of this colourful desert state dotted with royalty.

Long ago, the Swantara Party fielded many former rulers in Assembly as well as in Lok Sabha elections against Congress party candidates. They always made a big impact on the out come of these elections.

The royal list was headed by Maharani Gayatri Devi of Jaipur, Hanuwant Singh of Jodhpur, Maharawal Dungarpur and other former rulers of many other principalities in Rajasthan.

Most of them were able to reach the Assembly or Lok Sabha. But later this first generation of former Rajas and Maharajas lost their interest in politics and they limited themselves to managing their heritage and other properties.

But some scions of the former ruling families are still in active politics and Vasundhara Raje, former Maharani of Dhaulpur and the last outgoing chief minister of Rajasthan, tops the list.

In the coming Lok Sabha elections, the state is set to witness at least two interesting contests where the scions of former rulers of Jodhpur and Alwar will be contesting.

There were times when these former rulers were able to defeat their rivals, mostly commoners, with a convincing margin. But today, the scene has changed. Now the scions are facing tough opposition as most of these families have lost their respect and popularity among the masses.

Jodhpur, home town to Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot, is all set to witness a direct contest between a member of the former ruling family of Jodhpur and a commoner.

The Congress party has chosen Chandresh Kumari, elder sister of Gaj Singh, former ruler of Jodhpur, as its candidate, whereas the BJP has again fielded Jaswant Singh Bishnoi, its two-term Lok Sabha member from here.

Though Gaj Singh and family members were never in active politics, Chandresh Kumari plunged into active politics in Himachal Pradesh after her marriage in the former ruling family of Kangra. She was twice elected to the Assembly as a Congress candidate. She was married to Aditya Dev Chand Katoch way back in 1968. She was elected to the state Assembly in1972 and 1982 and was a minister in the Balbhadar Singh government. She was elected to the Lok Sabha in 1984.

The BJP was under pressure from its traditional Rajput supporters to nominate some one from the community as the seat has become Rajput dominated after the delimitation of constituencies. But party leaders preferred a Bishnoi, as Jodhpur is the only area in the state where Bishnois are in greater number.

After December’s Assembly elections, the candidature of Chandresh Kumari for Lok Sabha had become very clear. She had actively campaigned for Gehlot and other Congress candidates in the city. It was Digvijay Singh, AICC general secretary, more than Gehlot, who pushed the candidature of Chandresh Kumari from here.

Though during all these years Gaj Singh maintained close contacts with BJP, he never campaigned for the party. But at the same time, he used to send message to his followers to work for BJP candidates.

In the last Assembly election, BJP leaders urged him to stay away from it. They felt, people in the city were very angry with their former ruler, as he did not bother to come out from his palace to console the families who had lost their relatives in the Chamunda Devi temple tragedy in which about 200 people were killed in a stampede.

But now Gaj Singh will have very little or no choice to come out in support of his sister. At the same time Rajput leaders are pressing him to actively campaign for his sister to ensure the victory of a Rajput candidate. BJP leaders are sure that this would go against Chandresh Kumari as people in the city have not yet forgotten the temple tragedy.

As she has been living away from Jodhpur for the past four decades, she is also considered to be an outsider.

But Congress leaders are confident that she will prove a good bet for the party in this  BJP strong hold, where the party has won two of the three Assembly seats The victory margin of Gehlot in the third city seat was much below expectation.

Away from Yadav land in Bihar, Alwar district is an area in Rajasthan, where this community has always played an important role in electing the Lok Sabha member from here. Not sticking to any one party, the electorates here prefer to pay more attention to personalities than parties.

This time Jitender Singh, who is better known as a close aide of Rahul Gandhi, than as as an AICC secretary, is trying to encash his image in the coming Lok Sabha elections as a Congress party nominee. A scion of the former Alwar royal family, he was recently crowned as Maharaja of Alwar, after the death of his grand father Maharaja Tej Singh. He lost his father Pratap Singh years ago.

But making him a Congress candidate from here has not gone down well with the two- lakh strong Yadav community. They feel that the Congress party leadership has done injustice to the community by not giving a ticket to them.

On the other hand, the BJP fully knowing the sentiments of the community has a Yadav candidate in Kiran Yadav, a former Zila Pramukh and wife of former Lok Sabha member Jaswant Singh Yadav. Yadav left the Congress party on the eve of the Assembly elections.  He joined the BJP which made him its candidate in Behror where he defeated Dr Karan Singh Yadav of the Congress, who presently represents Alwar in the Lok Sabha.

Jitender Singh was initiated into politics by her mother Mohinder Kumari, who once represented the seat in Lok Sabha as the BJP nominee. In 1998 she joined the Congress to become its candidate for the 1999 Lok Sabha seat. She was defeated by Jaswant Singh Yadav, who at that time had left the Congress to join the BJP. In this election, young Jitender Singh for the first time confronted the electorate.

In the 2003 Assembly elections, Jitender won the Alwar seat as a Congress party nominee. When the party was selecting its candidates for the recent elections, the Congress party said he would not contest these elections as the party high command would prefer to send him to the Lok Sabha. Dr Karan Singh Yadav was given the ticket instead for the Assembly with the understanding that he would not stake a claim to the Lok Sabha seat.

Many Congress functionaries in the area feel that although Jitender Singh enjoys the image of a clean politician, the caste balance is not in his favour and that the BJP will not leave any stone unturned to exploit the caste factor.

They say if Dr Yadav was made the party candidate from Jaipur (Rural), it would satisfy the community and it would stick to the Congress as it did in the last election. But for the moment this is not happening as the Jats are staking its claim to Jaipur (Rural).

But the supporters of Jitender Singh have their own calculations. They say about 1.5 lakh  Meo Muslim voters would have no option but to vote for him as they will not cast their votes in favour of the BJP at any cost. This will neutralise the loss of the Yadav votes.

Mahant Chandnath, a former BJP legislator, was also a strong contender for the ticket.  But the party preferred Kiran Yadav, as her husband Jaswant Singh Yadav has the image of a strong Yadav man in the area.

Since he has contested many elections from here in the past, he enjoys a considerable following, which is more loyal to him than to any party. He was able to make his wife the Zila Pramukh, though she was novice in politics. But his opponents says, Yadav’s image of a habitual party changer and a corrupt politician will go against his wife in this election.