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After Vishnu Deo Sai in Chhattisgarh and Mohan Yadav in Madhya Pradesh, the BJP threw yet another surprise in Rajasthan by picking first-time MLA Bhajan Lal Sharma as Chief Minister.
Diya Kumari, a member of Jaipur’s erstwhile royal family and MLA from Vidyadhar Nagar, has been made Deputy Chief Minister, while caste and class equations were sought to be balanced by the appointment of Prem Chand Bairva, a Dalit leader, as the second Deputy CM in the desert State.
Rajasthan Election: Who won, lost or was dethroned?
The stamp of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP’s chief strategist and Home Minister Amit Shah was evident in effecting a generational change in all the three States where the BJP defeated the Congress in the just-concluded Assembly elections. Three stalwarts in the provinces – Shivraj Singh Chouhan in MP, Raman Singh in Chhattisgarh and Vasundhara Raje in Rajasthan – were replaced by new leaders without any overt show of resentment or protest. As Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, who was among the three central observers sent to Rajsthan, emphasised Raje was not just present during the anointment of Bhajan Lal Sharma as the BJP’s new face, she also proposed his name as CM.
Raje handed a bouquet to the 55-year-old Sharma, who was standing quietly in the third row in the legislature party meeting till his name was called. The non-descript new CM fought his first election for the Rajasthan Assembly from Sanganer, a seat bordering Jaipur. Sharma won from Sanganer with a margin of over 48,000 votes though the massive win is more credit to the BJP’s dominance in this seat. Sharma, in fact, had to face opposition from the supporters of the sitting MLA from Sanganer Ashok Lahoti.
The newly-appointed CM comes from the BJP’s mammoth organisational structure, having started his political career with the RSS’ student wing – the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP). Originally from Bharatpur in eastern Rajasthan, Sharma has been active in the BJP State organisation, serving as general secretary for the past over a decade.
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