Passed over for Rajasthan CM post, BJP warms up to ‘absent’ Raje before LS polls

With the Lok Sabha polls expected to be announced in a few weeks, the ruling BJP has begun addressing the few issues that remain in its Rajasthan unit.

Among them is reconciliation with former two-term chief minister Vasundhara Raje, though officially there is no bad blood between her and the party. But after she skipped a few party engagements, CM Bhajan Lal Sharma visited her at her residence in Civil Lines area on Friday, spending close to half an hour there.

Raje, a six-time MLA and five-time MP, was among the frontrunners for the CM’s post after the BJP returned to power in the Assembly polls held late last year. However, the party leadership chose first-time MLA Sharma for the post. Since then, Raje had distanced herself from the party and a month into Sharma’s tenure, she had skipped three key party programmes.

The first was the oath-taking ceremony of the ministers on December 30. The second instance was when Prime Minister Narendra Modi reached Jaipur ahead of the All India Conference of Director Generals and Inspector Generals of Police and met the party’s newly elected legislators at the state party office in the city on January 5. However, Raje was among the absentees. Then, at the party’s January 12 meeting for the Lok Sabha elections, all the top party leaders were present except Raje.

However, she was among those who received Modi at the Jaipur airport on January 25 ahead of his programmes with French President Emmanuel Macron, the chief guest for Republic Day this year, in the city.

CM Sharma’s meeting with Raje was seen as an attempt to normalise relations ahead of the Lok Sabha elections. “She is a two-term CM and indispensable for the party. And her influence is not just in the Hadoti region but all across