Outlook English - Print Subscribers Copy Outlook English, 30 July 2018 | Page 15
O L D D EF ECTS
NANDAN DAVE
by Darshan Desai in
Ahmedabad
Congress leader requesting
anonymity told Outlook.
Amit Shah is tapping
into this, his focus being
UJARAT’S
on the key Saurashtra
26 out of
region which is the ‘UP’
26
seats
of Gujarat politics—it
form a cru-
sends the maximum, 52
cial chunk of
legislators, to the 182-mem-
the whopping
ber state assembly (as many
282 Lok Sabha seats that
as seven Lok Sabha seats out of
the BJP won in the 2014
the 26 are here) and the caste
general elections. The reali-
factor plays a key role, too. In the
sation that a dip of even one
previous assembly elections, the
seat in Narendra Modi’s prized
Congress had made a huge comeback
state would mean it may be worse
after more than two decades, getting as
elsewhere is prompting BJP chief
many as 30 out of 52 seats in the region
Amit Shah to pull out every stop to
on the back of the Patidar movement
drive a spanner in the works of the
HANDY VIZIER BJP President Amit
and severe agricultural stress. Rahul
Congress in Gujarat.
Shah seems to have a plan for Gujarat
Gandhi’s two three-day gruelling
The beginning was made by four-
tours in Saurashtra ahead of the
time MLA from Jasdan constitu-
elections were also instrumental
ency, former MP and OBC Koli
in revving up the Congress cadre.
leader Kunwarji Bavaliya, who quit
The BJP knows that Lok Sabha
the Congress last week to join the
2019 is not the same as Lok Sabha
BJP and was made a cabinet minis-
2014, even in Gujarat. The indi
ter the very same day. Days before
cation came in the December 2
017
this, former MLA and Rajkot
strongman Indraneel Rajyaguru Pre-2019, the Congress loses influential assembly elections when the party
staved off defeat by just seven
called it quits, though he main-
leaders in Gujarat, some to the BJP
seats. It won 99 seats in all, while
tains he will never join the BJP.
the Congress managed 77, improv-
Rajyaguru, Gujarat’s richest MLA
in 2017, had vacated his safe seat of Rajkot former MPs have the capability to over- ing its tally of 61 in 2012.
For the Congress, the key contribution
East that he won in 2012 and, on Rahul turn even a BJP wave.
or
Those who quit the Congress claim that in this surprisingly improved perf
Gandhi’s request, chose to contest from
Rajkot West against CM Vijay Rupani in the seniors and old timers have not been mance was from Saurashtra. It was
2017, where he lost. He, however, rem given their due. This began following the exactly the opposite for the BJP there.
generational shift in the Congress lead- There are at least four Lok Sabha seats in
ained a key Congress figure in Rajkot.
Both former Congress MLAs had similar ership, after party president Rahul this region: Amreli, Jun