BTP, Owaisi come together for Gujarat local polls, target Congress vote bank

This comes over a week after Asaduddin Owaisi of the AIMIM declared his support to the BTP in Rajasthan.

In what could be music to the BJP in Gujarat, the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) has struck an alliance of sorts with the Bharatiya Tribal Party (BTP) of Chhotubhai Vasava who is already smarting after “treachery” by the Congress in neighbouring Rajasthan.

File photo: AIMIM president Asaduddin Owaisi.(PTI)

This comes over a week after Asaduddin Owaisi of the AIMIM declared his support to the BTP in Rajasthan, triggering speculations of his party making forays in the desert state after Bihar and more recently Uttar Pradesh.

Gujarat tribal leader Chhotubhai Vasava’s BTP, which has two assembly seats in Rajasthan, withdrew support to the Ashok Gehlot government after the Congress and the BJP ganged up to ensure the BTP candidate in Dungarpur did not win as zila parishad president. Both parties also joined hands to defeat the BTP on three panchayat samiti seats.

Not only did Vasava, an MLA from Jhagadia in Bharuch district who had bailed out Congress veteran Ahmed Patel in the 2017 Rajya Sabha elections, pull out support in Rajasthan, he also did so in two local panchayats in the tribal region. However, the BTP is known to have backed BJP nominees in the Rajya Sabha polls in Gujarat this year.

The BTP, which also has two MLAs in Gujarat, has announced that joining hands with Owaisi’s party and would jointly contest the local body elections in the state likely to be held in February 2021.

“We have come together and would contest the local body elections to restore democracy and teach the two opportunistic parties (BJP and Congress) a lesson,” Chhotubhai Vasava told reporters in Bharuch.

The already beleaguered Congress knows this is bad news for the party in Gujarat. Leader of Opposition in state assembly Paresh Dhanani told Hindustan Times, “This is a frustrated BJP’s B team. BTP plus AIMIM equals BJP. We know this well. But Congress will win, people have seen through the game.”

Gujarat BJP president CR Patil appeared quite nonchalant. “Let them fight the elections, it is a democracy. We will fight them too.” Asked if this wasn’t an advantage for the BJP, Patil said, “We don’t see anything from such a prism. We work hard, our development agenda speaks, we go to people with that.”

Political analysts see this as a clear marriage of convenience that may lead to electoral polarisation in Gujarat. Political and social scientist Vidyut Joshi says, “All these alliances are largely positioning, and have little to do with ideology. The BTP will fight only tribal seats, while Owaisi would look at Muslim dominated seats in major cities. However, in both cases, this will lead to consolidation of non-tribal and non-Muslim vote in favour of the BJP.”

Former state Congress president and senior leader Arjun Modhwadia told Hindustan Times, “AIMIM has become a national B Team of the BJP. They did it in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and now they are coming to Gujarat. But this time, BJP’s tricks won’t work, you will see it.”