Congress president Rahul Gandhi, on Friday, finally announced that senior leader Ashok Gehlot will be stepping in as the next Chief Minister of Rajasthan, while Sachin Pilot will take over as the deputy CM.
This brings a tense tussle for the top position in the state to an end, which began as soon as the results of the December 7 assembly polls came in on Tuesday, in which Congress had swept up an impressive victory over the incumbent BJP government. It took several rounds of meetings and deliberations over the past 36 hours to bring Pilot on board.
Picking Gehlot for his third stint as head of the state, the party lived up to their tradition once again, of hitching their political wagon behind the old guard over the young Turk. In light of the upcoming Lok Sabha polls in 2019, this is also a careful choice of experience over energy, considering Gehlot’s sway over the state’s various minority communities.
Last year, when the 67-year-old Gehlot was called back to Delhi to assume general secretaryship of the party, he was also handed the charge of the Organisation and Training department. At the time, many believed that this was done to clear the way for 41-year-old Pilot, who was then made the chief of Rajasthans Congress unit.
What led up to Gehlot’s hattrick
Gehlot has been credited with keeping the party together time and again; earlier this year, he played a seminal role in putting the post-poll coalition government together in Karnataka. Even when people were convinced that Congress would back Pilot as the chief ministerial candidate, Gehlot was seen actively participating in the election campaign this year.
Following the recent election, the scales tipped exceedingly in his favour, because the party’s victory wasn’t exactly emphatic (one shy of the 100-majority mark). This is believed to have reshaped Gandhi’s thinking, ultimately choosing Gehlots experience and acceptance over Pilots energy and discipline. The two-time chief minister emerged as the clear choice before the 2019 polls; even Pilot was got behind the strategy.
With the Lok Sabha elections in sight, Congress wants to utilise Gehlots popularity among the states various backward caste groups. Reputed for his sardonic humour and political acumen, Gehlot is known for being an accessible leader who knew how to efficiently address minority interests, who form a seminal vote bank in the state.
Often referred to as Rajasthan’s (Mahatma) Gandhi, for his simple lifestyle and mass connect, Gehlot’s contributions to the Congress unit in the state vastly outnumbered Pilot’s who also played a huge role in rebuilding the unit after it was decimated to just 20 lawmakers in the 200-member assembly in the 2013 polls. Gehlot has held the chief ministers office twice, from 1998 to 2003 and then from 2008 to 2013, and was the MLA-elect from Sadarpura consituency this year.
Prarthana Mitra is a staff writer at Qrius