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Rebellion, protests mark last day of filing papers for phase 1 of Gujarat polls
According to the election commission (EC), 89 of the state’s 182 assembly seats, largely in the state’s South Gujarat and Saurashtra regions, go to the polls on December 1.
Protests and rebellion marked the final day of filing nominations for the first phase of assembly elections in Gujarat on Monday with the Bharatiya Janata Party, Congress and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) fighting dissension in their ranks.
According to the election commission (EC), 89 of the state’s 182 assembly seats, largely in the state’s South Gujarat and Saurashtra regions, go to the polls on December 1. The other 93 seats vote on December 5 and the result will be announced on December 8, along with Himachal Pradesh. The BJP is looking for its seventh straight assembly election victory in a state it considers a stronghold. The Congress will hope to repeat its impressive performance in 2017 when it gave the BJP a run for its money and the AAP is looking to make inroads in both BJP and Congress vote banks and garner a sizeable chunk of votes in its maiden outing.
The BJP has declared 178 nominees and dropped at least 38 sitting lawmakers. The Congress has picked 142 people and denied tickets to three sitting MLAs. The AAP has named 178 candidates.
Congress workers stormed the party headquarters in Ahmedabad and burnt posters of senior leader Bharatsinh Solanki to protest against the decision to nominate sitting MLA Imran Khedawala from his Jamalpur-Khadia seat in the city.
“People are free to protest but the party will not tolerate such violence. The Gujarat Congress president has sought for an inquiry into the matter and soon action will be taken against those behind the violence,” said Manish Doshi, Gujarat Congress spokesperson.
Protestors defaced the Congress office building’s walls with spray paint, alleging that Solanki got monetary benefits from Khedawala and ignored Youth Congress leader and former councilor Shahnawaz Shaikh in the Muslim-dominated seat in Ahmedabad.
The BJP faced factionalism in Surat, where the powerful Koli Patel community was angry after the party leadership fielded senior BJP leader Sandeep Desai and dropped sitting MLA Zankhana Patel in the Choriyasi assembly constituency.
Hundreds of Koli community members took to the streets in Hazira, Dumas, Abhva, Bhimpore, and Magdalla industrial belt in protest. The Koli Patels are furious with the BJP leadership for fielding Desai, a Brahmin who heads the Surat unit of the party and holds key positions in cooperative entities.
“Choriyasi assembly seat has more than 1.60 lakh Koli Patel voters out of the entire 5.64 lakh voters,” said Dipak Patel, leader of the Koli Patel samaj in Hazira.
He said that the Koli Patel community in Choriyasi seat agreed unanimously not to allow Desai to campaign in their villages by erecting boards and posters against him. The BJP has held the seat since 2012 with Zankhana Patel winning the seat by 110,000 votes in 2017, the second-largest margin in the state.
The BJP announced Desai’s candidature two days ago after a protracted period of speculation. The majority of Choriyasi constituency is part of the Navsari Lok Sabha constituency, which is represented by Gujarat BJP chief CR Patil.
The Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), which is fighting the election in alliance with the Congress, suffered a setback after its only sitting MLA, Kandhal Jadeja, resigned from all party posts and joined the Akhilesh Yadav-led Samajwadi Party (SP). Jadeja, who was denied a ticket, filed his nomination from his Kutiyana seat in Porbander district.
“I’ve quit the NCP and have joined the Samajwadi Party. The party has given me the mandate to contest for the Kutiyana seat following which I filed my nominations for the assembly elections,” Jadeja said.
According to the terms of the alliance, the NCP is contesting three seats -- Umreth (Anand district), Naroda (Ahmedabad) and Devgadh Baria (Dahod district) – and hence dropped Jadeja.
The BJP is facing troubles of its own in Waghodia after its sitting lawmaker Madhu Srivastava threatened to fight the election as an independent after being dropped. Waghodia goes to elections in the second phase on December 5 and the last date for filing of nomination form is November 17. The Waghodia constituency has been a bastion for Srivastava since 1995, when he contested and won as an independent. The BJP fielded Ashwin Patel from the constituency this time.
In Wadhwan of Surendranagar district, the BJP earlier named Jigna Pandya as the candidate but she later declined to contest, asking the party to nominate someone else instead. A BJP official said on the condition of anonymity that there was dissent from local party workers against her candidature. The BJP has given the ticket to Jagdish Makwana in her place.
In the Matar assembly seat in Kheda district, the BJP and AAP were hit by dissension. The BJP denied a ticket to sitting legislator Kesarisinh Solanki and chose Kalpesh Parmar. Kesrisinh quit the party and on Thursday joined the AAP.
The AAP had fielded Mahipatsinh Chauhan but made a last-minute change and declared the defector as its nominee. An infuriated Mahipatsinh quit the AAP and decided to contest as an independent. But on November 12, the BJP placated Kesarisinh who said he would rejoin the BJP. AAP has decided to field another candidate Lalji Parmar in place of Mahipatsinh. Kesarsinh has not been given a ticket.
