Jaipur: Rajasthan minister of state for soldiers’ welfare Rajendra Gudha has claimed that he was offered Rs 25 crore if he voted for a particular candidate in the recent Rajya Sabha elections. The MLA, who switched from the Bahujan Samaj Party to the Congress, claimed that he was similarly offered Rs 60 crore during the rebellion against Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot in 2020.
Gudha said he spurned both offers though he did not mention any leader or a party who had made the offers while making the allegation. Gudha was addressing an event at a private school in Jhunjhunu on Monday. In a video that surfaced on Tuesday, he is heard replying to a question from a student. “I had an offer of Rs 25 crore to give my vote to one person. I then asked my wife,” he said, adding that she told him that they would rather have “goodwill”. He also referred to the rebellion against the Gehlot government by the then deputy chief minister Sachin Pilot.
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“I would also like to tell you that when the political crisis was going on, I had an offer of Rs 60 crore. I talked to my family. My wife, son and daughter said that they want goodwill and not money,” he said. “When those with you think like that, everything will be fine,” he told the schoolgirl. Gudha is one of the six MLAs who won the 2018 assembly elections as BSP candidates and joined the Congress in 2019.
They remained in the Gehlot camp when Pilot and 18 other Congress MLAs revolted against his leadership in July 2020. Gudha was made a minister of state, handling the department for the welfare of ex-servicemen, during the cabinet expansion in November 2021. Gehlot has repeatedly accused the BJP of trying to destabilize his government by offering crores of rupees to MLAs.
In the Rajya Sabha elections held for four seats in June, the BJP had supported independent candidate and media baron Subhash Chandra. Chandra was defeated. Three ruling Congress nominees and a BJP candidate won the RS elections from the state.
