In Rajasthan, Cong chief ministers held sway for long

JAIPUR: Sixty-four years ago, on March 30,1949, Rajasthan came into being when late Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, who was the Union home minister, administered the oath of office to late Maharaja Sawai Man Singh II of Jaipur as the Raj Pramukh and Maharao Bhim Singh of Kota as Upa Raj Pramukh. The position of Raj Pramukh was equivalent to that of a governor. The state of Rajasthan was formed following the merger of 22 principalities. Earlier, the state was known as Rajputana which was ruled by a three-tier system — the British, the princes and the nobles. The Constitution came into force on January 26, 1950 and prior to that, the chief ministers were called the prime minister.Heera Lal Shastri was administered the oath as prime minister of Rajasthan at Jaipur’s City Palace on March 30,1949. It was the first fragrance of democracy that the state smelled.Shastri was a favourite of Maharaja Sawai Man Singh and late G D Birla played a key role in making him the first prime minister of the state. However, the first day of modern Rajasthan witnessed an ugly incident when freedom fighters like Jai Narayan Vyas, Manikya Lal Verma, Mohan Lal Sukhadia, Gokul Lal Asawa, Dwarka Das Purohit and Mathura Das Mathur boycotted the function at City Palace because they were not given proper seats. In fact, they were unhappy with the way the cabinet was formed ignoring them. They wanted Gokul Bhai Bhatt of Sirohi to become the prime minister, but Patel wanted Shastri. In 1949, after Independence, when the popular Jaipur state government was formed, Shastri became the prime minister (the chief minister was then called as prime minister). After the Constitution came into effect, he became chief minister, a position he held till January 5,1951. Later he was forced to quit as he did not enjoy majority.Following Shastri’s resignation, an ICS officer, CS Venkatachari was made chief minister for an interim period with another ICS officer Bhola Nath Jha to assist him.In April 26, 1951 the Pradesh Congress decided to form a government with PCC chief Jai Narayan Vyas as the chief minister. But Vyas faced problems from the erstwhile princes and jagirdars. In the first election for Vidhan Sabha in January 1952, Congress barely got a majority, and Vyas lost the election.On March 3, 1952, following the defeat of Vyas, Tika Ram Paliwal became the chief minister. But Paliwal faced lot of problems and Vyas supporters made him a candidate for the Kishangarh byelection which he won and replaced Paliwal as chief minister again on November 1,1952. Then Paliwal joined him as the deputy chief minister.However, Vyas faced lot of problems as CM and in a trial of strength, he lost to Mohan Lal Sukhadia and resigned as chief minister.Sukhadia became chief minister in 1954 and ruled altogether for 17 years. After him, Barkatullah Khan served as the CM for 27 months and after his death on October 11, 1973, Harideo Joshi became the chief minister and served for six-and-a-half years in two terms.Jagannath Pahadia served as chief minister for 13 months and was replaced by Shiv Charan Mathur. But barely 15 days prior to the Vidhan Sabha election, Mathur resigned and Heera Lal Devpura became chief minister for barely 17 days and Joshi was made the chief minister once again after Congress came to power in 1985.Bhairon Singh Shekhawat served as the chief minister on three occasions and ruled for ten-and-a-half years. After that Ashok Gehlot became the chief minister.