Why Rajasthan Congress made its young Dalit face Tikaram Jully leader of Opposition

Jully, 43, is a Dalit leader and a third-time MLA. His appointment is seen as a move to consolidate Scheduled Caste votes. Continuing with Dotasra, under whom the Congress lost the recent assembly election, indicates the party’s focus on his Jat community. The Congress is estimated to have secured more Dalit and Jat votes than the BJP in the 2023 election.

However, the two appointments go beyond caste calculations. Dotasra, despite being in the centre of many controversies, succeeded in winning the assembly election from Laxmangarh. Some also credit him, along with rebel BJP leader Yunus Khan, for ensuring the election defeat of the BJP’s Rajendra Rathore, who was leader of the Opposition in the outgoing assembly, and other BJP candidates in the Shekhawati region, where the Congress did well. Even the BJP’s Jat face and former state chief Satish Poonia lost from Amer.

In continuing with Dotasra as well as Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa as general secretary in charge of the state, the Congress plans to go into the Lok Sabha polls with the same assembly election team. If the Congress succeeds in winning a few seats in the general elections, it will be a major achievement, given how the party lost all 25 parliamentary seats in Rajasthan both in 2014 and 2019, when Sachin Pilot was state unit chief.

The Congress believes its 70 assembly seats won in 2023 translate into 10 Lok Sabha seats in 2024. But that’s too simple an assessment because the party had lost all 25 seats in 2019 despite winning 100 seats the 2018 assembly election. Besides caste calculations, the Lok Sabha polls will also have factors like the Ram Temple in Ayodhya, not to speak of strategies that the ruling BJP may deploy.

By appointing Jully as leader of the Opposition, the Congress has taken a bold decision. It means that irrespective of the Lok Sabha election results, he will continue in office, with no chance of Pilot getting the post in the near future. Of course, the Congress may have a rethink on continuing with Dotasra and Randhawa if it is wiped out in the Lok Sabha elections in Rajasthan. But as of now, the party hopes to do better than in 2014 and 2019, especially as part of the INDIA coalition, and may even try to keep the Rashtriya Loktantrik Party and local tribal parties in the Udaipur division on its side.

Congress leaders are pleased about winning the Karanpur assembly seat, where elections were adjourned due to the death of its candidate, and plans to aggressively cash in on dissidence in the BJP over several veterans being denied a place in the Bhajan Lal Sharma cabinet.

The BJP, on the other hand, has expectedly shifted Chandrashekhar, the party’s general secretary (organisation), to Telangana. He succeeded in bringing the party to power in Rajasthan by sidelining most of Vasundhara Raje loyalists. However, his working style was strongly resisted by many in the party. It remains to be seen what other changes the BJP effects in the state organisation to counter the Congress. For now, though, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s appeal and the Ram temple put it on a strong wicket for the general elections.igation, farm mechanisation, horticulture, pension schemes, and schemes for informal labour and special assistance.

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