The voting for Rajasthan Assembly Elections 2023 is scheduled for 25th November. The results will be announced on 3rd December with four other states, Mizoram, Chhattisgarh, Telangana and Madhya Pradesh. For Rajasthan, the assembly constituency Pokaran is expected to be a closely contested battle.
In the 2018 Assembly Elections, incumbent Congress MLA Saleh Mohammad won the seat with a thin margin of 872 seats. Mohammed, who is a Muslim preacher’s son, will face Swami Pratap Puri, a Hindu seer and Bharatiya Janata Party candidate. As both candidates have strong religious affiliations, experts believe it will be a close battle in Pokaran.
Mohammad serves as Minority Affairs Minister in the Congress-led Gehlot government in Rajasthan. He claimed that the development work done by the state government would move the voters away from religious considerations. He further claimed that the achievements of the current government in the region are substantial and urged the voters to choose development over religion.
On the other hand, Puri, who represents the dominating Rajput community in the state, countered Mohammad’s claims, stating the development work he talked about was merely pre-election promises. He asserted that the performance of the Congress government in the state has no comparison to the BJP-led central government’s performance at the centre. “Congress government starts work, but there is no guarantee that it will complete the work,” he said.
Pokaran has a diverse voter base. It primarily consists of Muslims and Rajputs. The local issues and the personal connection of the candidates to the voters play an essential role in the outcome of the elections. The residents of the region believe that religion plays a crucial role in voting decisions. The Hindus lean towards the BJP, while the Muslims lean towards the Congress. They also emphasise the importance of dealing with community issues and connecting to the people on the ground level.
Analysis of historic voting pattern in the Pokaran region
The historic voting pattern shows voters consider local issues in Assembly Elections and national issues in the Lok Sabha elections. While the assembly elections in 2018 ended in a close battle, the Lok Sabha election results in 2019 were a definitive win for the BJP.
If we look at the voting patterns from the past, in the 2018 Assembly Elections, there were a total of 1,95,607 electorals in the assembly. 1,72,068 cast their votes in the elections, standing at 87.97 per cent. Mohammad secured 82,964 votes, and Puri secured 82,092 votes. There was a marginal difference between the two.
In the 2013 Assembly elections, BJP’s Shaitan Singh secured 85,010 votes, while Mohammad secured 50,566 votes. Data shows that Congress’s vote share increased exponentially from the 2013 and 2018 Assembly elections while BJP’s vote share decreased.
Pokaran falls in Jaisalmer district under the Jodhpur Lok Sabha constituency. According to ECI data, in the 2019 General Elections, BJP’s Gajendra Singh Shekhawat secured 81,591 votes out of 2,01,102 total valid votes. On the other hand, Congress’s Vaibhav Gehlot secured 61,780 votes.
Similarly, in the 2014 General Elections, BJP’s Gajendra Singh Shekhawat secured 72,440 votes out of 1,70,003 total valid votes. On the other hand, Congress’s Chandresh Kumari secured 34,664 votes.
While local politics for Assembly Election witness a wide range of deviations including religion and local issues, it is evident that in the Lok Sabha elections, Prime Minister Modi’s face value play a vital role in Rajasthan’s political arena.
