By Anish Singh

Ajmer, Nov 22 (UNI) In the ensuing Rajasthan assembly elections, the independents are all set to give a tough fight or even may snatch the seat from the sitting legislator in Ajmer south.

The seat is reserved for scheduled castes. Population wise, the Raigars are dominating this constituency while politically Kolis are very strong.

Despite Raigars have huge presence and knowing that the caste politics is at its zenith in the state, the national parties preferred to bank upon Koli candidates. There are more than 40,000 voters belonging to Raigars community while 35,000 from Kolis.

In this election, the contest here becomes more interesting as for the first time a person from Raigar community is taking on both the BJP and Congress candidates.

Rakesh Shivashiya, a medical practitioner and two-times former legislator Lalit Bhati are campaigning very hard in an effort to defeat Anita Bhadel, sitting lawmaker who is also a Minister of Child and Woman Welfare in the Rajasthan government. Ms Bhadel is contesting for the fourth times.

Congress has repeated its candidate Hemant Bhati this time. Last time, he lost the election to Ms Bhadel with a margin of 29,000.

Talking to UNI, Mr Shivashiya said, "By the grace of god, I have everything. I have not come to contest election to earn money. We have seen both the parties did not do anything for the Ajmer south seat."

After failing to get ticket from both parties, he filed his nomination as an independent candidate.

on being asked about what would be your focus area if you win this seat he said, "Earlier, Ajmer used to be a center of education but it has been shifted to other parts of the state. I will bring back the glorious past of Ajmer south."
While talking to a local fruit seller on polls topic, he said, "We want change but we do not see any capable candidate than Ms Bhadel."

"I have worked a lot for my constituency and it is my commitment to take the developmental work ahead. I'm travelling across my vidhan sabha and I'm getting huge support," Ms Bhadel, a minister in Vasundhara Raje government told UNI over phone.

Congress candidate Hemant Bhati accused the BJP of privatizing the power sector and said, "The ruling party has given contract of power supply distribution to Tata Group, earlier the consumer used to receive an electricity bill of Rs 1000 every month but now everyone has to pay Rs 3000-4000 per month. The public are not happy with them and they will support me in this election."

The constituency has a total of 2,06,000 voters. Apart from Raigars and Kolis, other scheduled castes voters constitute of 20,000. There are 25,000 Sindhis, 20,000 Malis and 15,000 Muslims voters in Ajmer South seat.

Raigars are considered as Congress votebank while Kolis are BJP's. There are 32 wards, out of which 18 are held by the BJP and Congress has 14.

The state goes in polling on December 7.
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