The BJP has been winning Gujarat since 1995. Narendra Modi’s tenure as chief minister of Gujarat became the launch-pad for his journey to national politics and the office of prime minister. When the state votes in early December, therefore, the BJP, riding the “double-engine” slogan, is expecting not merely a win — it has set itself a challenge of beating the record of 149 seats (out of 182) that the Congress under Madhavsinh Solanki won in 1985. In the 2017 assembly election, the Congress ran the BJP close and brought its tally below 100 seats. Clearly, the BJP doesn’t want a repeat of the last election and has been in campaign mode for months now. With the prime minister, the party mascot, travelling to Gujarat frequently and announcing new projects, Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel, who replaced Vijay Rupani in a Cabinet makeover in September last year, has been more in the shadows.
The entry of the Aam Aadmi Party has introduced a new frisson in the contest. Gujarat has been a two-party state ever since the Janata Dal state unit disintegrated in the 1990s, soon after leading a coalition with the BJP to office in 1990. BJP rebel Shankarsinh Vaghela’s attempts to carve out a third space did not succeed though he was CM for a short period with the backing of the Congress. Unlike the Janata Dal and Vaghela, the AAP is an outsider in Gujarat politics. The party’s unexpected success in the 2021 Surat Municipal Corporation elections — the Congress failed to win a single ward — has created the impression that the space for a non-BJP, non-Congress party exists in Gujarat and the AAP could step into it. The AAP has been running an aggressive campaign with Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal spending time in the state. It remains to be seen if the party’s urban-centric campaign focused on its government’s claims in Delhi in the fields of education and health and its playing to the Hindutva gallery can compensate for the lack of organisational presence in rural Gujarat.
In 2017, rural Gujarat, roiled by the Patidar unrest and agrarian distress, had backed the Congress — the BJP’s numbers were buoyed by its near-sweep of urban centres including Ahmedabad, Vadodara, Surat and Rajkot. Congress also ran a spirited campaign with young leaders — Hardik Patel, Jignesh Mevani and Alpesh Thakore — amplifying the party’s message. Patel and Thakore are now with the BJP and the Congress campaign was delayed as the party got busy in the Bharat Jodo Yatra and the AICC president election. An improvement over its 2017 tally is crucial to the Congress’s battle to stay relevant ahead of the 2024 general election.
