Rajasthan: Prominent Jat leader, Rahul Kaswan, sitting BJP MP from Churu joins Congress
Kaswan was inducted into the party by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and is likely to be the party's candidate from Churu for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls
By : The Federal
Update: 2024-03-11 08:49 GMT
Rahul Kaswan, sitting BJP MP from Churu in Rajasthan, joined Congress on March 11. This is the second prominent Jat leader to quit the BJP and join the Congress.
Kaswan was inducted into the party by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and is likely to be the party's candidate from Churu for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.
A two-term MP from Churu, Kaswan was denied a ticket by the BJP this time round.
Kaswan's rebellion
The BJP's decision to field paralympic gold medalist Devendra Jhajharia from the seat had led to Kaswan's rebellion. For the past several days, the Jat leader had been holding rallies across the Churu constituencies as a show of strength and hitting out at the BJP on various issues.
Churu has been a stronghold of the Kaswan family.
His father, late Ram Singh Kaswan, had won the seat for the BJP four times (1991, 1999, 2004 and 2009) and Rahul won the seat in 2014 and 2019, both times with margins of 2.94 lakh and 3.34 lakh votes, respectively. Rahul's mother, Kamla Kaswan, was also a BJP MLA from the Sadulpur assembly segment in the Churu Lok Sabha constituency back in 2008.
Haryana
After Hisar MP Brijendra Singh, Kaswan is the second prominent Jat leader to quit the BJP and join the Congress ahead of the Lok Sabha polls.
Brijendra Singh had joined the Congress on March 10, while his father, former Union minister and veteran Jat leader from Haryana, Chaudhary Birender Singh, is expected to formally switch to the Congress later this month at a massive rally being scheduled in Haryana's Hisar.