Rajasthan Civic Boards Hang on Congress, BJP Vote Counts

The battle is especially tight in the state’s ten municipal corporations, where both parties have made board formation a prestige fight. BJP says it has a clear majority in Jaipur, Udaipur, Kota and Bhilwara, while Congress has the upper hand in Bikaner; Ajmer and Jodhpur remain finely balanced.

Congress leaders are most exposed in Jodhpur, Ajmer and Alwar, where the numbers are less secure and factional tensions are high. In Jodhpur, the home district of former chief minister Ashok Gehlot, and in Ajmer and Bikaner, party managers have spent days trying to prevent defections and keep councillors aligned.

The risk for Congress is not just losing a board but losing it from within. In Udaipur, where 65 wards produced 29 seats for Congress, 21 for BJP and 15 for independents, a rebel candidacy has turned the contest into a three-way fight and raised the odds of cross-voting.

In Alwar, Congress has 42 councillors in an 80-seat house, compared with 27 for BJP, 10 independents and one RLP member, but the party still needs to keep its bloc intact to form the board. BJP is counting on split loyalties inside Congress to narrow that gap, while Congress is trying to hold the line after moving councillors to Karnataka for containment.

The political stakes are also personal. The results will be read as a measure of influence for Gehlot, senior Congress leaders BD Kalla and Tika Ram Jully, and BJP figures including Vasudev Devnani, Arun Chaturvedi, Anita Bhadel and city party chief Ramesh Soni.

What happens next is the board-forming race itself: whether numbers on paper hold once councillors vote, or whether defections and tactical abstentions flip control in tightly contested urban bodies.