Nihalchand Chauhan

Nihal Chand Chauhan also known as Nihal Chand Meghwal (born 4 February 1971) is an Indian politician belonging to the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Early life

Nihal Chand was born to Bega Ram Chauhan, a two-time M.P of Ganganagar and Surji Devi into Meghwal community. He completed B.A from Shri Nehru S.P Evening College at Bikaner, Rajasthan. He married Jyoti Chauhan in 1992.

Political career

In 1995, at the age of 24, Nihal Chand was elected as the "Panchayat Director" of Nanuwala, Sardarpura Bika and Bagicha. He was also elected as the pradhan (chief) of the Raisinghnagar panchayat committee. In 1996, he became the youngest Member of Parliament (MP) from Rajasthan at the age of 25. He was elected to the 11th Lok Sabha (lower house of the Parliament of India) on a BJP ticket from Ganganagar. In the next general election in 1998, he was defeated by Shankar Pannu of Congress.

Subsequently, Nihal Chand won the 1999 and 2004 general elections from Ganganagar as a BJP candidate. In 2008, he lost the Assembly elections to Daulat Raj of Congress from Raisinghnagar. In 2009, he lost the Indian general elections to Bharat Ram Meghwal of Congress. In 2014, he defeated Bhanwarlal Meghwal of Congress on the same seat. He served as a Minister of state (MOS) in the Cabinet of Prime Minister Narendra Modi from May 2014 to July 2016. This caused a controversy, with the opposition party Congress demanding Nihal Chand's resignation. BJP refused to oblige, pointing out that Nihalchand was given a "clean chit" in the case when Congress was in power in Rajasthan.