Sachin Pilots Congress Home

After the euphoria of celebrations will follow the harsh reality of finding a leader who can deliver on poll promises when the raje regime has left state coffers empty

- Rohit Parihar

Rajasthan continued its ‘revolving door’ tradition by voting out the Vasundhara Raje-led BJP government with 73 seats, and making way for a Congress government, giving it 99 of the 199 seats that went to the polls. Interestingly, the Congress, with 39.3 per cent vote share, got just 0.5 per cent more votes than the BJP, but still significantly higher than its 2013 share of 33.1 per cent.

Unlike arch-rival Ashok Gehlot, 67, who was the chief minister when the Congress sunk to its lowest depths in 2013 with just 21 seats, 65-year-old Raje almost matched her 2008 poll performance when the BJP bagged 78 seats. Only this time, she had the Congress’s Sachin Pilot as her main rival.

“We have increased our tally five-fold, which is commendable, though we could have done better,” says a jubilant Pilot, who, if made the CM at 41, may be among the youngest chief ministers India has seen.

Pilot, who was appointed the Pradesh Congress Committee president in 2014 by Congress president Rahul Gandhi, had to accommodate recommendations by Gehlot and Rameshwar Dudi, the leader of the opposition who lost in this election, during ticket distribution. This resulted in the party fielding fewer young candidates, which is perhaps why the party has end ended with a simple majority instead of a bigger win. Twenty-six of the 40 under-40 candidates the party fielded won. Pilot claims the party managed to woo first-time voters because it fielded young faces.

Pilot began his PCC tenure as a leader who could lead from the front—from contesting the Lok Sabha polls from Ajmer knowing well that the Narendra Modi wave would make it impossible for him to win, to leading agitations and organising protest marches against inflation and rapes. This is in contrast to Gehlot, who despite claiming to be a Gandhian, has rarely participated in grassroots agitations.