For five years, the Congress struggled to not let the tension between Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and his former deputy Sachin Pilot upstage the narrative of its welfare model but all its efforts fell short, as out of the 31 seats that the Congress lost in the Rajasthan Assembly election, 14 come from the eastern part of the State, where Mr. Pilot’s community, the Gujjars, hold sway.
In 2018, when the Congress came to power, Mr. Pilot was the party president in the State, and many felt that he was the rightful claimant to the Chief Minister’s post. But the party leadership thought otherwise and Mr. Gehlot took over the mantle for the third time. The Congress has been stumbling from one crisis to other from the July 2020 mutiny by Mr. Pilot that nearly endangered the Gehlot government to the September 2022 crisis when Mr. Gehlot’s supporters cocked a snook at the party’s central leadership by boycotting the meeting of legislators called by them and organised a parallel meeting instead.
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Five Ministers contesting from eastern Rajasthan lost in the election, including Vishvendra Singh from Deeg Kumher, Ramesh Meena from Sapotra, Mamata Bhupesh from Sikrai, and Prasadi Lal Meena from Lalsot. Both Mr. Singh and Mr. Meena were among the 18 MLAs who were with Mr. Pilot during his 2020 revolt, only to switch loyalties later. Including Mr. Pilot, only three of the 11 Gujjar candidates fielded by the Congress won.
The Gehlot-Pilot rivalry left a fertile ground for the BJP to till for votes. Three days before the State went to polls, Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his campaign speech invoked Mr. Sachin Pilot’s late father, Rajesh Pilot, and said that the Gandhi family had punished him and was now punishing his son. His words resonated with the Gujjar sentiment that not only was Mr. Pilot was sidelined, he was repeatedly humiliated.
In the run-up to the Assembly election, as the Congress’ pink posters came up across the State, Mr. Pilot found himself in a stamp-size slot along with other State and central leaders, with Mr. Gehlot’s image looming large. Barring the rallies addressed by former Congress president Rahul Gandhi, where the Rajasthan Congress put up a united a front, Mr. Pilot did not step out of his constituency for campaigning till November 16. According to his supporters, he was not provided any logistical assistance from the State leadership. He could cover the other constituencies in the vast State only when he was provided a helicopter.
Other than a prosaic statement accepting the verdict delivered by the electorate posted to his social media accounts, Mr. Pilot has not spoken out. But those close to him indicate that the war between the two sides is far from over. “Those who are pointing at the rout in eastern Rajasthan should first look at their own backyard. In Jodhpur, which is Chief Minister’s home district, the Congress lost seven of the ten seats. This is not Congress’ defeat — it is the defeat of only one man’s ego,” a leader close to Mr. Pilot said.
