Rarely have Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders looked as downcast as they did on Wednesday, hours after Congress leader Ahmed Patel won his Rajya Sabha seat from Gujarat. Opposition leaders in Parliament were reminded of the gloom that prevailed in BJP ranks after its Assembly poll defeat in Bihar in 2015. In further bad news, a BJP Lok Sabha member from Ajmer, Sanwar Lal Jat, passed away in the morning. The seat is now headed for a by-poll and the BJP government in Rajasthan is not said to be quite popular, while the Congress led by its state unit chief Sachin Pilot is resurgent. There was speculation in Parliament that Pilot might choose to contest the by-poll. Pilot was sent as the member of Parliament from Ajmer in 2009, and lost to Jat in 2014.
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