Former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Digvijaya Singh said on May 16 that he was ready to contest the 2024 Lok Sabha polls against Union Minister Jyotiraditya Scindia from the latter’s family bastion of Guna.
Mr. Singh, a native of Guna himself, made the statement at a press conference in Seoni where he was asked about the possibility of him contesting the 2024 general elections. He is currently touring to 66 Assembly segments identified as vulnerable by the Madhya Pradesh Congress on the basis of multiple electoral losses in the past.
“I will do anything the party orders me to,” he said. He went on to add that he was a Rajya Sabha member presently and there was no need for him to contest the general elections. “But I am a soldier of the party and would do whatever the party directs me to do,” he said.
Both Mr. Scindia and Mr. Singh unsuccessfully contested the 2019 Lok Sabha elections as Congress candidates. While Mr. Scindia lost to one time protege-turned opponent K. P. Yadav, his first defeat in the stronghold of Guna, Mr. Singh lost to BJP’s Pragya Yadav.
Mr. Scindia’s political switch the following year with a group of 22 Congress MLAs in March 2020 paved the way for BJP’s return in Vallabh Bhawan while he himself was offered a Rajya Sabha candidature by the BJP and was also inducted in the Union Cabinet of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
It was in the same year that Mr. Singh was also elected to the Rajya Sabha and both will have a substantial part of their tenures in the Upper House of the Parliament left when the 2024 elections are scheduled.
Mr. Singh and other Congress leaders have often accused Mr. Scindia of switching loyalties in exchange of Ministerial berths. A few days ago while the Karnataka results were being announced, the former CM had claimed that there was no “Scindia in Karanataka” to help an Operation Lotus, a term used by opponents to describe BJP’s efforts to effect defections to cause a downfall of State governments not ruled by them.
Responding to Mr. Singh’s statements on contesting elections, Madhya Pradesh BJP spokesperson Pankaj Chaturvedi said he was trying to hog the limelight by using Mr. Scindia’s name. “Mr. Singh has himself said that wherever he goes for campaigning his party loses, how can he talk about contesting and winning elections. He is making this statement to stay in news and will repeatedly make such statements as the campaign [for the 2023 Assembly polls] pick up,” said Mr. Chaturvedi.
