The flags of the BJP and the Congress.
Credit: PTI Photos
Jaipur: The recent victory of the BJP in Haryana has buoyed the confidence of the party's Rajasthan unit ahead of the bypolls on seven assembly seats going to take place on November 13.
The ruling party leaders are hoping to win all the seats while the opposition Congress leaders are expecting the results to be in its favour.
Out of the seven seats on which bypolls are to be held, four of them were with the Congress and one each with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Bharat Adivasi Party (BAP) and Rashtriya Loktantrik Party (RLP).
Voting for bypolls on seven assembly seats -- Jhunjhunu, Dausa, Deoli-Uniara, Khinvsar, Chaurasi, Salumbar and Ramgarh will be held on November 13 and the results will be declared on November 23.
The BJP has been proactive in its preparations, having compiled a list of probable candidates for each vacant seat and which has already been submitted to the central leadership for final decision.
On the other side, the Congress is also engaging in candidate selection, seeking feedback from party members and local leaders to ensure they choose representatives who resonate with the electorate.
BAP is also planning to contest three seats.
BJP state president Madan Rathore claimed that the party will win all the seven seats in the assembly bypolls.
"The BJP workers are fully prepared. 'Lotus' will bloom on all seven seats going to the bypolls," Rathore said.
Expressing confidence in the functioning of the Bhajanlal Sharma government, which came to power in December, Rathore said the state government has done welfare work for all sections of society in 10 months.
"The BJP workers will go among the people with the works of the government and the party candidates will register victory with majority on all seats," he said.
Reacting to Rathore's claim, Congress state president Govind Dotasra said that the BJP will get zero seats in the bypolls as the people are fed up with the governance in the state in just 10 months.
"People are disappointed and fed up with the BJP government. No governance is seen and law and order has completely deteriorated. There are multiple power centres and it is not clear who is ruling the state," he said.
"People have seen the misrule of the BJP government and will not vote for the BJP in the bypolls... The nine to ten months of the BJP government in Rajasthan have left people completely disappointed and distressed. People are saying that the government has become a circus," Dotasra said.
Rajasthan Pradesh Congress Committee general secretary Swarnim Chaturvedi said the present political atmosphere is in favour of their party.
He said the party is actively doing consultation to select the best candidate to ensure victory.
"Detailed work on candidate selection is going on. The atmosphere is in the favour of the Congress party," he said.
"We are conducting thorough consultations to identify the best candidates for each seat," said Swarnim Chaturvedi, Congress spokesperson.
The BAP MP from Banswara-Dungarpur, Rajkumar Roat, said the party was planning to contest elections on Chorasi, Salumbar and Dausa seats. It has not been decided yet whether an alliance with any party will be made, he said.
"Our party leaders will take an appropriate decision whether an alliance should be done or not," he said.
Two of these byelections are being held due to the death of the sitting MLAs -- Ramgarh's Congress MLA Zubair Khan and Salumbar's BJP MLA Amritlal Meena. In five constituencies, the MLAs were elected as MPs in the Lok Sabha polls, necessitating bypolls.
Congress MLAs Brijendra Ola (Jhunjhunu), Harish Chandra Meena (Deoli-Uniara) and Murari Lal Meena (Dasau); RLP MLA Hanuman Beniwal (Khinvsar) and BAP MLA Rajkumar Roat (Chaurasi) were elected as MP in the Lok Sabha elections this year.
Currently, the 200-seat state assembly has 114 MLAs of the BJP, 65 of the Congress, three of the BAP, two of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), one of the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) and eight Independent MLAs.
According to official data, there are 1,862 polling stations and 19,36,532 voters in the seven assembly seats going for the bypolls.