Sachin Pilot: The Lone Wolf In The Rajasthan Politics (Image: X @SachinPilot)
Congress leader Sachin Pilot, the shining star in the 2018 Rajasthan polls, is the key figure of the party in the state. In 2018, while forming the Rajasthan government, senior leader Rahul Gandhi was in a dilemma about choosing the chief ministerial face. However, the two-time chief minister, Ashok Gehlot, became the chief minister, and Sachin Pilot accepted the post of deputy chief minister. This time, the Congress leader strongly believes that he will be rewarded for his loyalty if the party retains power.
Sachin Pilot, the 46-year-old politician, has served in several roles for the Congress party. This included being the president of the Rajasthan Pradesh Congress Committee and being minister with independent charge of corporate affairs, communication, and IT in the union government. In 2004, when Sachin Pilot was elected from the Dausa constituency in Rajasthan during the Lok Sabha election, he also became the youngest citizen in the country to become a Member of Parliament. The Congress leader achieved this title at the age of 26. In 2009, he became the Union Minister of State for Communications and Information Technology and continued in the post until a cabinet reshuffle in 2012. After the reshuffle, Sachin Pilot became the minister of corporate affairs under the UPA administration. Notably, he was one of the few to be given the independent charge of a ministry at that time.
Sachin Pilot, son of late Congress leader Rajesh Pilot, refocused his attention on Rajasthan state politics in 2013. The young leader was asked to take on this challenge as the Congress party faced the worst defeat in the 2013 state election. The party won only 21 seats at that time, and on the other hand, the BJP had a massive victory with 163 seats. However, the Congress made a historic comeback in Rajasthan in the 2018 state assembly election and bagged 100 seats. Sachin Pilot, an alumnus of St. Stephen’s College, played a vital role in this victory.
The conflict between veteran Ashok Gehlot and young leader Sachin Pilot began in 2018 over the chief minister”s position. In 2020, this conflict reached its peak as Sachin Pilot, along with 18 Congress MLAs loyal to him, led a revolt against Gehlot. In July 2020, Congress removed Sachin Pilot from the role of deputy chief minister of Rajasthan and from his position as the state unit chief. The rebellion led by Sachin Pilot actually helped Ashok Gehlot make his position strong, but Pilot was sidelined in the party. In 2022, the death of a Dalit student after being beaten by a school teacher in Jalore again sparked turmoil between the two leaders. On that occasion, Sachin Pilot severely criticized the Rajasthan government and said that “there must be something lacking.”
The Congress party made several efforts to end the conflict between the two key leaders in Rajasthan, but it did not work. In April 2023, Sachin Pilot announced a one-day hunger strike against his own government. He also said that he appealed to CM Gehlot to act on the allegations against the previous Vasundhara Raje government but got no reply. He sat on a hunger strike on April 11, accompanied by thousands of his followers. Meanwhile, the party urged him to resolve any issues within the party forum.
In August, Sachin Pilot was inducted into the Congress Working Committee (CWC). This indicates the leader”s return to the mainstream of Congress. On October 31, Sachin Pilot filed his nomination for the Rajasthan Assembly election polls from Tonk constituency. Ajit Singh Mehta is the BJP candidate contesting against Sachin Pilot. In 2018, Sachin Pilot won the seat with a margin of over 54,000 votes. Sachin Pilot is the popular Congress leader among the youth and the Gujjar community.
In 2018, Rahul Gandhi shared a picture on X (formerly Twitter) with Jyotiraditya Scindia on his right and Kamal Nath on his left, in the context of Madhya Pradesh assembly election result, in which there was an almost similar situation like in Rajasthan. “The two most powerful warriors are patience and time,” wrote Rahul Gandhi while sharing the image. After the Rajasthan elections, it will be revealed whether the Congress will reward Sachin Pilot for his efforts and patience, especially, some of his UPA-time young colleagues from the party have already found new nests, mainly in BJP.
