Jodhpur—the second largest district in Rajasthan and one of the 13 Lok Sabha constituencies in the state going for polls on April 29—is grabbing eyeballs thanks to a contest between Vaibhav Gehlot, Congress candidate and son of Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and Gajendra Singh, BJP candidate and Minister of State, Agriculture in the Union Government.
The importance of the seat can be understood from the fact that out of Ashok Gehlot 136 meetings in Rajasthan till now, 93 have been conducted in Jodhpur alone.
Speaking with Moneycontrol, Gajendra Singh questioned, "I just want to ask Ashok Gehlot that how many meeting he held at the time when Badri Jakhar, son of a farmer was contesting from Jodhpur or Chandresh Kumari fought election from Jodhpur. This time Gehlot is going home to home for seeking vote for his son."
Singh further alleged the Chief Minister has been misusing the government machinery in this election which is not acceptable.
Singh also accused Gehlot of failing to send a list of eligible farmers to the Centre for PM's recently-launched Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme.
"BJP government is giving Rs 6,000 per year to farmers. However, the Rajasthan government has not sent the list of farmers to the ministry, just for avoiding political benefit to BJP. Moreover, they have not waived off the farm loans, a promise that Rahul Gandhi made during assembly election"
Interestingly, Jodhpur is the only seat in Rajasthan where Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP President Amit Shah—both came to campaign. However, Singh downplayed it saying it was just a coincidence that both visited the constituency from where he is contesting.
Gajendra Singh thinks a local leader Hanuman Beniwal's political outfit, Rashtriya Loktantrik Party's (RLP) inclusion in the NDA will aid his cause. "We welcome his party in the NDA. Surely, we will get more jat votes because of Beniwal. RLP is the only party that in 19 days of formation won three assembly seats."
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