The BJP had a not-so-united house in Rajasthan this time as it went to the elections. It was no match in front of Ashok Gehlot’s gala freebie announcement including the ‘Chiranjeevi Health Insurance Scheme’ offering free treatment up to Rs 25 lakh and free mobiles. The BJP also was no match to Congress when it came to plastering the state with massive advertisements asking people to vote. Yet, the Congress lost in Rajasthan.
16 Exam Paper Leaks No Joke
The biggest electoral issue that created massive angst, particularly, between 20 and 30 years old in the state was as many as 16 exam paper leaks, which are now being probed as scams by central agencies. Rajasthan is often joked as the paper leak capital of India by the state people. On average, Rajasthan has seen over three paper leaks every year since 2019, affecting close to 40 lakh students.
The issue became so indefensible that Congress leader and former deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot himself went ahead and attacked the Gehlot government in an election year for not doing enough to catch the real culprits.
Just before the polls, the Enforcement Directorate officers raided the premises of state Congress president Govind Singh Dotasra in Jaipur and Sikar as part of a money laundering probe into the alleged exam paper leak case. Interestingly, Dotasra was the former education minister, and was alleged by the BJP to be the central person to this ‘scam’. During an interview with News18, BJP’s Kirodi Lal Meena, the whistle-blower in a series of ‘scams’, alleged, “Among the big fish, there are three ministers and six MLAs. I can name those three ministers right away — Subhash Garg and Govind Dotasra. Another minister Sukhram Vishnoi wasn’t directly involved, but his staff were.”
It is an open secret in Rajasthan that it costs between Rs 5 and 15 lakh to avail the leaked papers well in time.
Crime Against Women
Not only the state has record number of crimes against women but some specific incidents were surfaced on social media and left a scar on the minds of many Rajasthani women — a significant section of the electorate.
In 2019, a woman was allegedly raped by five men in front of her husband in Alwar district. In August this year, a 17-year-old schoolgirl was allegedly kidnapped and gang-raped by eight men in the same district, making it the fourth such case to be reported in the district in 24 hours.
The incidence of registered crime against women in Rajasthan increased from 18,344 in 2010 to 41,623 in 2019, registering a growth of 126.90%. Rajasthan stood second in crimes against women in 2021, according to National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). In July, Union minister Anurag Thakur lashed out at Rajasthan’s poor performance on crime against women and said, “I want to ask Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi if they know of the woman who was gang-raped in Alwar in front of her husband and her video was made viral; the police didn’t bring it out in the open due to elections”.
Beyond the politics, the sheer number of women standing in voting lines this time in Rajasthan may have caused the Congress problems. Female voter turnout in Rajasthan has surged from 41.1% in 1962 to 74.7% in 2023. Many of them were upset with Ashok Gehlot’s handling of law and order situation when it comes to crime against women.
Minority Appeasement
The BJP has repeatedly hammered the Gehlot government before and during the election in Rajasthan on minority appeasement which News18 witnessed making an impression among voters during its ground reportage.
The centre of the charge has been the Udaipur beheading incident when one of the assailants, identified as Muhammad Riyaz Attari attacked Kanhaiya Lal, a tailor, with a sharp weapon while the other, Muhammad Ghaus, recorded the crime on his mobile phone, last year. Kanhaiya Lal’s crime was extending support to suspended BJP leader Nupur Sharma for her controversial comment.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, while campaigning in Udaipur in October raised the matter, “What happened in Udaipur was not even imagined by anyone… People come on the pretext of getting clothes stitched and cut the throat of tailor without any fear or dread. Congress saw a vote bank even in this case. I want to ask Congress what did the party do during the Udaipur tailor killing, they played vote bank politics…” Home Minister Amit Shah labelled similar charges in many rallies.
While Udaipur’s beheading occupied people’s memory strongly, there have been other incidents as well that bolstered BJP’s charge. This October, protests were held in Jaipur by Hindu organisations accusing the Ashok Gehlot government of appeasement politics. Traders from Jaipur’s old town joined the protest, alleging increased terrorist activities and threats to Hindu shopkeepers.
This October, 65-year-old priest Ramjilal Sharma was allegedly thrashed by a man in an inebriated condition in Kalakho village in Dausa who succumbed to injuries at the Sawai Man Singh (SMS) Hospital in Jaipur. Leader of Opposition Rajendra Rathore had blamed it on “appeasement policy”.
Overall, the BJP’s allegations were complemented by repeated incidents and the Congress started to attract the tag before the elections.
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