The Gujarat unit of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Saturday appointed its tribal MLA Chaitar Vasava from Dediapada as the leader of the legislature party and Jamjodhpur MLA Hemant Khava as deputy leader. The decision announced by AAP national general secretary Sandeep Pathak, was posted on the party's Twitter handle. The AAP has just five MLAs in the 182-member Gujarat Assembly, while the BJP has 156 and the Congress has 17 MLAs — falling short of one seat from qualifying for leader of opposition that requires 10 per cent share of the seats. Vasava said that as a leader he would present issues of tribals especially related to "education, health and infrastructure like roads and connectivity" in his maiden Budget session of the Gujarat Assembly to begin February 24. “We will not do showbaazi like the Congress. make noise (in the assembly) and walk out. We will become a powerful voice of the people", Vasava told The Sunday Express. The AAP leader said that his party was preparing to file questions in the Assembly including on how there were 25 schools in his constituency “which had just one teacher, and there are 68 schools that are in a dilapidated state”. "If the Prime Minister (Narendra Modi), as chief minister, launched the Beti Bachao Beti Padhao from here, he has to keep his promise,” said Vasava. He also says he will take up the issue of land acquisition for the Saputara-Shamlaji road project. “The land acquisition for this project has been done in complete violation of the constitution, of the 1996 PESA (Panchayats (Extension to the Scheduled Areas) Act) and without consulting the gram sabha", Vasava said. Married with two wives, Vasava said Shakuntala, his first wife who has been a member of the Narmada District Panchayat winning the seat since 2015 the first being as Janata Dal (U) candidate, continues to be a member of the panchayat. She “helps fill in for my absence in the constituency", he said. Both his wives quit their respective jobs to help Vasava in his election campaign. Shakuntala worked with the Development Support Agency of Gujarat (DSAG) , an arm of the state Tribal Development Department, while Varsha, his second wife, is a trained nurse and worked in a government health unit in Dediapada. Vasava, 34, was a close confidant of Bharatiya Tribal Party (BTP) president Mahesh Vasava, who was elected MLA of Dediapada in 2017. Chaitar Vasava, who held much influence in Narmada district as a BTP leader since 2014, was instrumental in ensuring the party's win in 2017. He resigned from BTP to join AAP and won defeating BJP candidate Hitesh Vasava. Deputy leader Khava, 38, won the Jamjodhpur constituency in Jamnagar district against BJP's Chiman Sapariya by 10,403 votes. Khava was fielded by the party on the seat of Congress MLA Chirag Kalariya. Belonging to the Ahir community, Khava is a resident of Mota Vadia village of Jamjodhpur. According to his affidavit, Khava has studied till Class 11 in Shri Gunda Kelvani Mandal run secondary school, which he completed in 2003. Jamjodhpur is a swing seat which has elected MLAs from both BJP and Congress earlier— Congress in 2007, BJP in 2012, Congress in 2017.
