BJP ignores ‘no repeat’ policy in Bharuch, puts faith on Mansukh Vasava, its strongest tribal face

Party leaders said the BJP had initially planned to field a non-tribal leader as an experiment. But Mansukh was back in the reckoning in mid-February, following BJP’s National Tribal Convention at Jhabua in Madhya Pradesh, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi met the tribal leaders from Gujarat.

A party leader said, “After the tribal convention, it was known that Mansukhbhai was being considered again. However, five leaders of the district unit had voted against repeating Mansukh. But as Chaitar became the INDIA bloc candidate, BJP did not want to make any changes in the constituency.”

Chaitar, who has been booked in an alleged case of extortion and assault of a forest officer last November, is currently out on bail and has started campaigning in Bharuch.

A leader said that BJP had “made a mistake” in 2022 of underestimating Mansukh’s opponent. “Currently, if there is one leader who can aggressively counter everything that Chaitar says or does, it is Mansukh. The two have been engaged in a verbal duel since Chaitar’s election as MLA.

In fact, Mansukhbhai was in charge of the seven Assembly constituencies under Bharuch Lok Sabha seat for the 2022 state polls… it would not be wrong to say that the party underestimated Chaitar’s popularity in Dediapada which led to him winning the seat by over 1 lakh votes…,” the leader added.

“Ever since, Chaitar has gained much popularity in the tribal areas of Bharuch that make up 40 per cent of the vote share. Dropping Mansukh at this point will not help BJP, which is aiming for a clean sweep of 26 seats in Gujarat.”

Although Bharuch is a general constituency, the BJP has been winning the seat since 1989. Chandu Deshmukh won the seat four consecutive terms from 1989 to 1998, defeating Congress stalwart Ahmed Patel. Mansukh has been the sitting MP since the 1998 bypolls.

“In tribal areas, people do not vote for parties but for local leaders, who they identify with. Replacing Mansukhbhai would give Chaitar an advantage, especially since Congress is not going to field a candidate and the Bharatiya Tribal Party, which Chaitar originally hails from, has disintegrated…,” the leader said.

Mansukh’s vote share has increased from 44.01 per cent in 2004 to 55.47 per cent in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Although attacked by Chaitar, who has repeatedly said that the MP has “failed to raise the real issues of tribals”, Mansukh is BJP’s strongest tribal face in the region.

During his current term as MP, he had “protested” on a number of occasions, including resigning from the party in 2020 protesting a notification of the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change declaring 121 tribal villages of Narmada as falling in the “eco sensitive” zone. He withdrew his resignation a day later.

More recently, he is said to have “vocally opposed” the party’s decision to hand out posts to newly-inducted turncoats from other parties – a sentiment he is said to have conveyed to state party president C R Paatil, with whom he does not share a close bond.

The infighting in Bharuch BJP was in the open last September, when Mansukh accused four BJP leaders, including two sitting MLAs, of “working to sabotage his chances”. He had even claimed that leaders in Jhagadia had been pushing the top party leaders to bring in Chaitar into BJP to contest in his place. Chaitar had also made similar claims of the BJP pressurising him to join the party.

What has also worked in favour of Mansukh, party insiders said, is his “clean image”. A senior leader said, “His outspoken nature often leads to trouble for the party but it is a quality that tribal voters identify with… Apart from his controversial statements about administration, there have been no complaints against him.

In fact, he enjoys the backing of business communities, as it is known that he does not try to influence or pressurise businesses to curry favours…”

Mansukh, who has termed his nomination as “faith shown by the party”, has begun his voter outreach campaign in the constituency.