BJP leaders fight over transfer, party downplays

Jaipur: Resentment over transfers of government employees hit a low point on Friday. Social media was abuzz with the message of a verbal spat between two ministers in Vasundhara Raje government, which said to have turned into a scuffle in which a minister allegedly slapped the other.

The minister involved in the alleged scuffle, are minister of state for education with independent charge Vasudev Devnani who has backing of the sangh, and minister of state for health Bansidhar Bajia, a jat leader from Sikar.

After the message went viral on social media particularly on twitter in which chief minister Vasundhara Raje, home minister Gulab Chand Kataria and Congress leaders Ashok Gehlot and Sachin Pilot were also tagged, the party bosses summoned the two ministers and efforts were made to hush up the matter.

Subsequently, both the ministers refused to talk. Senior party officials were also tight-lipped about the incident. State secretary, Chandrashekhar did not respond to the calls while state in charge Avinash feigned ignorance about the incident.

However, the eye witnesses at Mr. Devnani’s official residence, several of them transfer applicants as well as party workers claimed that there was scuffle between the two ministers and the education minister was slapped by Mr. Bajia.

According to reports, Mr. Bajia who is legislator from Khandela in Sikar district was upset about transfers of teachers in his constituency on recommendations of local BJP MP Swami Sumedhanand and district party president that too without his knowledge.

 Mr. Bajia had gone with a transfer list of his choice of employees, which was summarily rejected by the education ministers claiming that those who had recommended are also leaders of the party. This led to a heated argument followed by slapgate.

However, this was not the first time when resentment among BJP rank and file over transfers of government employees has came into public domain. Earlier, BJP MLA Shubhkaran Choudhary too had an altercation with the education minister while BJP MLA from Chaksu and health minister Kalicharan Saraf had openly sparred over transfer issue in the state assembly.

Former BJP minister Ghanshyam Tiwari who recently left the party to form his own outfit condemned the incident.