Following a controversy over the Congress candidate's association with pro RSS organisation the party had to change the ticket from Jaipur City Lok Sabha seat. Former minister Pratap Singh Khachariawas has been given a ticket in place of Sunil Sharma. At the same time, the BJP has cancelled tickets of its three sitting MPs.
The Congress made this change in its fourth list of Lok Sabha candidates for Rajasthan on Sunday night while MLA Murarilal Meena has been named from the Dausa Lok Sabha seat.
Sunil Sharma is associated with an allegedly pro-RSS organization Jaipur Dialogues. His political rivals in the party took on social media against him while some senior leaders including Shashi Tharoor also questioned this decision of the party.
Looking at the controversy Sunil Sharma himself offered to leave the candidature in a press conference. Shortly after this, his ticket was changed and Pratap Singh Khachariyawas was made the candidate.
Sharma who is known to be close to Sachin Pilot said to the media 'I am hurt that the party did not defend me. Those who conspired against me won. I have left the ticket myself. But I am not leaving Congress.'
In the meantime, the BJP has also released the second list of 7 candidates for Rajasthan. Three sitting MPs namely Nihal Chand Meghwal from Ganganagar, Narendra Kumar from Jhunjhunu and Ram Charan Bohra from Jaipur City Lok Sabha seat have been denied tickets this time. The party has fielded Priyanka Bailan, Shubhkaran Choudhary and Manju Sharma from these seats respectively, while MPs Sukhbir Singh Jounpuriya from Tonk - Sawai Madhopur and Bhagirathi Choudhary have been repeated.
Along with these former deputy speaker of Rajasthan assembly Rao Rajendra Singh has been named from Jaipur Rural and Mahima Singh from Rajsamand seat. Both will replace Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore and Diya Kumari respectively who are now MLAs and part of the BJP government in Rajasthan.
Mahima Singh belongs to the royal family of Udaipur and is the wife of recently elected MLA Vishvraj Singh from Nathdwara seat which is a part of the Rajsamand Loksabha constituency.
Congress goes in alliance with RLP in Nagaur
After the Communist Party of India Marxist, the Congress formed an alliance with the Rashtriya Loktantrik Party (RLP) in Rajasthan. The Loksabha seat of Nagaur has been left for RLP and party supremo Hanuman Beniwal will contest the election from this seat against BJP's Jyoti Mirdha. Both the leaders are facing each other for the second time in the same seat but with the change of party and alliance. In 2019, Jyoti Mirdha was the Congress candidate, while Hanuman Beniwal was with the NDA alliance.
