Jaipur, Jan 7 Challenges loom large over the first-time MLA from Rajasthan, Bhajan Lal Sharma, who is now the Chief Minister of the state.
Sharma had been a Sarpanch earlier and had also contested elections once as a rebel from the BJP, but then his deposit was confiscated. This time he became the MLA from Sanganer for the first time and was directly made the Chief Minister by the BJP’s top leadership.
Sharma has experience in running the organisation at the grass roots level, but has no experience of running a government. The biggest challenges for him will be dealing with the bureaucracy and his political opponents, say political experts.
Meanwhile, the first challenge for the BJP is to unite party factions in Rajasthan. The saffron party has made Sharma the Chief Minister by sidelining many veteran leaders within its ranks.
There are many big BJP leaders in the state, including former Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje, Kirodi Lal Meena, Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, Arjun Ram Meghwal and Rajendra Rathore to name a few.
Now, it will be Sharma’s responsibility to keep them united, or at least establish relationships with them so that they don’t plot or rebel against him.
Further, he needs to have the talent to convince the Opposition Congress on different issues.
The grand old party has many veteran leaders like Ashok Gehlot, Sachin Pilot, Govind Singh Dotasra, Pratap Singh Khachariyawas and Harish Chaudhary, who are considered to be very shrewd politicians. Handling them will be a big challenge for Sharma.
The other big test for Sharma is the bureaucracy which was quite dominant in the previous government.
Other leaders in the Ashok Gehlot Government and the public had started getting irritated with the bureaucrats around the then Chief Minister.
Managing the bureaucracy now will be a big task for Sharma since he does not have administrative experience.
However, the biggest challenge for Sharma will be financial management. Due to financial mismanagement, the new government will have to pay outstanding bills of Rs 30,000 crore.
On top of that, the BJP has promised to give LPG for Rs 450 per cylinder. Accomplishing this in the era of financial mismanagement will be a big test of Sharma’s skills.
There are many other issues that Sharma will need to handle. The youth of Rajasthan were angry with the Gehlot Government over the paper leak issue and the BJP also capitalised on this in the elections. Now, the challenge before Sharma is how to stop paper leaks and how to live up to the expectations of the youth.
After the formation of the BJP Government in Rajasthan and allocation of portfolios to 22 ministers in the Sharma Cabinet, voices of opposition are being heard.
The Marwar Rajputs in Jodhpur have expressed dissatisfaction with the Cabinet and say that the community has not got the place it expected in the BJP Government. The community has warned that if the BJP does not fulfill its demands then the party will have to face the consequences in the Lok Sabha elections.
Veteran journalist and political expert Prakash Bhandari said, “Finances are in a bad shape as the state has a debt of Rs 59 lakh crore and it is not even possible to pay interest. Financial management stands as the biggest challenge and it should be handled by experts otherwise the budget will be quite difficult to handle.”
Speaking on factionalism within the BJP, he said, “The party differences will be handled by the Centre as everything is handled in New Delhi. The Centre will be able to manage this crisis.”
Former vice chairperson of NITI Aayog, Arvind Panagariya, will lead the Sixteenth Finance Commission (SFC) and he will look into the issues on how to spend funds for developmental works. Panagariya has been called back and he shall be looking after the desert state’s affairs as he belongs to Rajasthan and knows everyone.
“Resource identification, its utilisation and restructuring of resources to create revenue is the biggest goal. Local taxes generate revenues and hence the biggest task is to generate revenue to manage state finances,” he added.
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