By Archana Sharma

Jaipur, Nov 3 (IANS): When the dates for the Rajasthan by-polls for two seats were announced, nobody thought they would trigger a debate on the dwindling prospects of the saffron party in the state. However, as soon as the results were announced on Tuesday, political circles were abuzz to find out what reduced the BJP to third and fourth position in the polls.

Bharatiya Janata Party sources confirmed to IANS that the party has been dented by the many factions with each group wanting to throttle the other which killed the BJP's prospects in the by-polls held in Dhariyavad and Vallabhnagar.

They confirmed that the first challenge emerged when many of the star campaigners including former CM Vasundhara Raje, Om Mathur, Gajendra Singh Shekhawat among others kept themselves at a distance from the campaigning.

Secondly, the party high command experimented for the first time in Dhariyavad deviating from its earlier policy of adopting an "emotional card" strategy and insisted on trying out a fresh face in the bypolls due to which the party lost its own seat in Dhariyavad.

The party fielded a new candidate here, which left the family of former BJP MLA Gautam Lal Meena, who died due to corona, aggrieved.

Meena's son Kanhaiyalal Meena was however later inducted into the party working committee to placate him. However, his followers voted for Thavarchand, an independent candidate, which made the BJP lose a chunk of its voters to other parties.

Thirdly, former CM Vasundhara Raje reportedly ensured that her loyalists did not join the present organisational set-up. When the party planned to field her loyalist and Janata Sena's convenor Randheer Bhindar's wife from Dhariyawad, she reportedly made all efforts to sideline her. Eventually, the party had to field a fresh candidate who could not emerge as a mass leader.

Fourthly, senior BJP leader and Leader of Opposition Gulabchand Kataria wanted his say in ticket distribution and when he was denied this, he kept aloof from the campaigning.

He wanted the BJP's Udailal Dangi to be the candidate, however, senior party workers wanted a Rajput face as Kataria's earlier comments in the bypolls had angered the community.

So Dangi was denied the ticket, but then he was fielded by the Rashtriya Loktantrik Party who gave a tough fight to ruling Congress candidate Preeti Sigh Shaktawat, wife of ex-MLA Gajendra Singh Shaktawat and emerged second.

The BJP candidate Himmat Singh Jhala meanwhile could not even save his deposit and ranked fourth in the list.

The BJP is plagued by all these issues since the last many months and party workers are left demotivated. But the question is why is the high command not taking note of the factionalism which is affecting the party's prospects.