Congress turns to Rajasthan ex-minister to broker truce between Gehlot, Pilot

Barmer/Jaipur: With just months to go for the crucial Rajasthan assembly elections, senior Congress leaders have asked former state minister and MLA Harish Choudhary to broker peace between chief minister Ashok Gehlot and his bete noire, Sachin Pilot, both of whom have been locked in a power tussle since 2018, according to senior party functionaries.

The development comes after Choudhary met senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on June 27 during his two-day visit to New Delhi to discuss the party feud, the functionaries said.

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Ever since the friction in Congress’s Rajasthan unit surfaced in 2018, the top leadership appointed three state in-charges – Avinash Pande, Ajay Maken and Sukhjinder Singh Randhawa – to pacify Gehlot and Pilot, but all efforts for a truce failed to yield desired results, the functionaries said.

With the state due to go to the polls later this year, Gandhi has now asked Choudhary to act as a mediator between the two leaders and resolve the factional feud at the earliest, they added.

“Choudhary has been asked to find a solution. He has met both Gehlot and Pilot,” a senior Rajasthan Congress leader said, seeking anonymity.

Choudhary, an MLA from Baytu, is believed to be a close aide of Gandhi and is also general secretary in-charge of Punjab Congress.

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Over the last week, the Baytu legislator has held a series of meetings with Gehlot, Pilot, Randhawa and state ministers like Pramod Jain Bhaya, Ram Lal Jat, Parsadi Lal Meena and Lal Chand Kataria in the past five to six days to discuss ways to settle the power tussle.

A second senior party leader said the “Congress high command is considering bringing a change in the organisation and government very soon.”

Differences between Gehlot, a three-time chief minister, and Pilot spilled out into the open in 2020 when the latter rebelled against the government, plunging the Congress administration into crisis. Then last year, lawmakers close to Gehlot did not attend a Congress Legislative Party (CLP) meeting in Jaipur called to elect a new leader at a time when it seemed almost certain that Gehlot would become the Congress president and Pilot would succeed him as chief minister.

The tussle between Gehlot and Pilot intensified on April 11 after the latter demanded action from the state government against alleged corruption by the previous Vasundhara Raje-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) regime, reconstitution of the Rajasthan Public Service Commission (RPSC) and compensation to those affected by the job exam paper leaks. In April, Pilot had observed a day-long fast over his demands, even as Randhawa said the protest was against the interests of the party.