Rajasthan elections 2018: Pilot, Gehlot among 152 names in Congress first list

Former Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and state Congress president Sachin Pilot are among the 152 candidates named in the party’s first list for the Rajasthan assembly election, released late on Thursday night.

Who is contesting where

Gehlot will defend his traditional Sardarpura seat in Jodhpur, which he is contesting for the fifth time in a row, while Pilot will make his assembly debut from Tonk. Pilot has twice been elected to the Lok Sabha, from Dausa in 2004 and Ajmer in 2009. Other prominent names include former Union ministers CP Joshi (Nathdwara, Udaipur) and Girija Vyas (Udaipur), and Leader of Opposition Rameshwar Dudi (Nokha, Bikaner).

The list has 18 women and about 64 changed faces. Two sitting MLAs were dropped: Ghanshyam Mehr of Toda Bhim and Narayan Singh of Dataramgarh, whose son Virendra Choudhary has been given the ticket instead.

Harish Meena, the Dausa MP, and Habibur Rehman, the Nagaur MLA, both of whom quit the BJP for the Congress on Wednesday, have also been given tickets, for Mahua and Nagaur respectively.

A marathon meeting

The list was cleared at a six-hour meeting of the party’s central election committee chaired by Congress president Rahul Gandhi, which began around 4 pm and ended at 10 pm.

The BJP’s lists

The ruling BJP has so far named 162 candidates across two lists, dropping 41 sitting legislators, five of them ministers. The 200-member assembly goes to the polls on December 7, with counting on December 11.

What happened next

The Congress won 99 of the 199 seats that voted on 7 December 2018 and Ashok Gehlot became Chief Minister.

See also: Political leaders

Originally published on 16 November 2018. Rewritten on 9 October 2026.

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