Populist budget likely as Raje, team discuss losses
A day after drubbing in by-elections, Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje held a meeting with four senior cabinet ministers, state party president and central party representatives to find reasons for the loss with the government likely to go for course correction in the forthcoming budget.
Initially, Raje had called the meeting of entire council of ministers but it was pruned to the core group of senior cabinet ministers on suggestion of the central party leaders, those familiar with the matter, said on condition of anonymity.
Rajasthan BJP president Ashok Parnami, party’s organization secretary Chandrashekhar and state ministers Gulabchandra Kataria, Rajendra Rathore, Arun Chaturvedi and Yunus Khan attended the meeting that lasted for about three hours.
None of the ministers were willing to speak on what transpired and one of them said: “My lips are sealed”. Raje has not spoken on the defeat so far.
Refusing to divulge details of the meeting, Parnami said, “We will take feedback from MLAs, district organization presidents and other office-bearers and
JAIPUR: We will take feedback from MLAs, district presidents and other officebearers and then minutely go through the reasons for defeat before coming to any conclusion ASHOK PARNAMI, Rajasthan BJP president
then minutely go through the reasons for defeat before coming to any conclusion.”
The BJP has lost the two Lok Sabha seats and an assembly seat to Congress in the by-polls whose results were announced on Thursday. The Congress had termed the victory as referendum of Raje government. “The results show that the BJP is highly unpopular in Rajasthan,” said state Congress president Sachin Pilot.
BJP leaders requesting anonymity said that some legislators had expressed reservation over the party’s candidates, especially in Alwar, where Jaswant Singh Yadav was fielded. “Some of our legislators did not