New Delhi: After Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot on Saturday claimed that the BJP was once again trying to topple the Congress government in the state, the BJP rejected the charges.
Gehlot slammed Home Minister Amit Shah and said, “They (BJP) tried to make the government fall in Rajasthan. After meeting with Amit Shah and (BJP leader) Dharmendra Pradhan our MLAs told me that they were ashamed to see Amit Shah as Home Minister. There was a time when Sardar Patel was Home Minister and now it’s him.” “They (BJP) were giving assurance that they have made five different governments fall and this will be the sixth one. BJP has been conspiring like this,” Gehlot said at a meeting with party leaders via video conferencing.
The BJP on Sunday rejected the charges, but things in Congress do not seem to be smooth after rebellion by a section of Congress led by then Deputy CM and Rajasthan Congress unit chief Sachin Pilot in July this year. Sachin is lying low since his open rebellion against Gehlot’s leadership.
Party sources say that Gehlot may be reminding the Congress central leadership about Pilot’s “misadventure” which the Congress survived a few months ago and that the state government was safe only in his hands amid talks that after Ahmed Patel’s demise Gehlot may be shifted to Delhi to keep a balance between the old and new guard in the Congress.
Meanwhile, in Maharashtra too, things aren’t good in the ruling alliance even though it has defeated BJP in Legislative Council polls recently, more so after Nationalist Congress Party leader Sharad Pawar’s remarks vis-à-vis Rahul Gandhi that have not gone down well with the Congress.
Pawar had said in an interview that Rahul lacks consistency, after which the Congress made it known that adverse comments against Congress leaders were not appreciated.
The Congress will have to keep a wary eye as it has already lost power to the BJP in Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka due to rebellion by a section of its MLAs since July 2019.
WITH AGENCY INPUTS