Royals of Rajasthan gradually diminishing from the electoral politics of the state

New Delhi, Nov 29: The royal touch in the Rajasthan Assembly elections is gradually diminishing from the past few elections. There were people from the seven royal families contesting the last Assembly elections but this time round just five families are contesting the state Assembly elections. And most of the Royal families are contesting elections on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) tickets.

Out of total five families that are contesting Assembly elections, four have been fielded by the BJP while one by the Congress. Though there is democracy in the country but love for royal families still continues in Rajasthan. This is the reason that not a single election has been such that in which no royal family participated. Royal families contested elections in 1962, 1967 and 1972 for forming their own political party Swatantra Party when managed 36 seats in 1962, 49 in 1967 and 11 in 1972.

All the big royal families in Rajasthan have been part of the electioneering in some point in time. Former queen of Jaipur Maharani Gayatri Devi had been Lok Sabha member from Jaipur thrice. Her son Bhawani Singh too contested Lok Sabha election but was defeated, former royal of Jodhpur Gaj Singh, Arvind Singh Mewad of Udaipur, Karni Singh of Bikaner, Maharani Mahendra Kumari of Alwer had also been in the Lok Sabha. Royal families of Jaipur, Alwar, Bharatpur, Dhaulpur, Kota, Bikaner, Bijaulia and Karauli have been active in electoral politics of Rajasthan.

In the last elections, there were seven MLAs from the royal families out of total 200 seats in the state Assembly and they included daughter-in-law of Dhaulpur royal family and present chief minister of Rajasthan Vasundhara Raje, daughter of Bharatpur royal family and Rajasthan tourism minister Krishnendra Kaur Deepa, Vishwendra Sing of Bharatpur Royal family, daughter of Jaipur royal family Diya Kumari, daughter-in-law of Karauli Royal family Rohini Kumari, daughter of Bikaner Royal family Sidhdhi Kumari and daughter-in-law of Bijaulia royal family Kirti Kumari.

But this time round three royal families are not active in the Rajasthan Assembly elections as tickets to Diya Kumari of Jaipur royal family and Rohini Kumari of Karauli royal family have been denied. However, Diya Kumari is active in the party programmes while Kirti Kumari had died. But Kota royal family has jumped into bandwagon of electoral politics as daughter-in-law of the family is contesting from Ladpura constituency. Her husband Ijjyeraj Singh was the Congress Lok Sabha member. Vasundhara Raje of Dhaulpur, Sidhdhi Kumari of Bikaner, Vishwendra Singh of Bharatpur, Krishnendra and Deepa Kumari are already contesting ongoing elections.