SHIFTING SANDS IN THE DESERT

Rajasthan serves the BJP a shock for ignoring issues that really matter to people and sidelining some of its tallest leaders. The party's state unit faces turmoil in the near future

- Rohit Parihar

Six months after handing the BJP a facile win in the assembly election, voters in Rajasthan sprang a big surprise in the Lok Sabha polls—handing the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) 11 seats and reducing the BJP, which had won all 25 Lok Sabha seats in the state in 2014 and 24 in 2019, to just 14 seats. Not just that, the BJP’s victory margins have plummeted, with only six candidates winning by 300,000-plus votes, as against 16 in 2019. Its vote share, too, plunged to 49.2 per cent from 58.4 per cent. The INDIA bloc made a clean sweep in eastern Rajasthan and Shekhawati regions. The BJP lost 72 per cent of all seven reserved seats; among three seats reserved for Scheduled Tribes, the BJP won one and INDIA two; among four seats for Scheduled Castes, it won one against three by INDIA. Where the BJP fielded candidates from reserved categories, it appears many general caste voters forsook it, especially its traditional Rajput vote bank. BJP heavyweights Union minister Kailash Chaudhary came third in Barmer-Jaisalmer, while Gajendra Singh Shekhwat (Jodhpur), Arjun Meghwal (Bikaner), Bhupender Yadav (Alwar) and Lok Sabha speaker Om Birla (Kota) won by reduced margins. The BJP suffered heavily in the first phase, losing eight of 12 seats for which polling was held on April 19.