Journalism of Courage
2017 Assembly elections in Gujarat saw the BJP finish at its lowest number of seats since 1995. The 22-constituency difference between it and the Congress or the fact that the BJP clinched nearly half the votes at 49%, however, was just part of the story. Several BJP leaders, including former ministers like Bhupendrasinh Chudasama and Saurabh Patel, scraped through last time by very thin margins. On 36 seats, the victory margin was less than 5,000 votes.
The BJP won 16 of these closely contested seats, and the Congress 18, while two were won by Independents. In as many as 63 seats, the margin was less than 10,000. Several names in the BJP’s 166 candidates declared so far (out of the total 182) are among those who had won narrowly last time.
Some among these marginal winners have switched to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) this time, and been fielded by it. Such names in the BJP list include Gujarat Health Minister Rushikesh Patel (Visnagar MLA); C K Raulji (Godhra MLA), who was in the Jail Advisory Committee that cleared the remission of Bilkis Bano case convicts, and who won by the second-lowest margin of 258 votes; Minister of State of Food and Civil Supplies Gajendrasinh Parmar (Prantij); and Babubhai Bokhiriya (the Porbandar MLA).
Chiman Shapariya, whom the BJP has brought back to contest elections from Jamjodhpur seat, lost the same constituency to the Congress in 2007 by just 17 votes (the lowest margin since 1995). He won in 2012 but had lost in 2017. After winning by 20,000-plus votes in 2007 and 2012, Rushikesh had seen his margin plunge to just over 2,800 in 2017 in Visnagar, largely due to the Patidar agitation, and has been fielded again. Neither Congress nor AAP has announced their candidates so far for this seat. Sources in the BJP said that given the party’s emphasis on “winnability”, some veterans have had to be dropped. Like in Dholka, where Chudasama, a Kshatriya, was dropped in favour of Kiritsinh Dabhi, who is a Karadiya Rajput, also an OBC, on a seat where Kolis hold the swing vote.
Even in the 2002 elections, when the Hindutva wave was at its peak and Narendra Modi was leading the BJP to his first election in the state, Chudasama had taken the seat by a margin of just 722 votes. In 2007 again, the Dholka seat had been a tight contest, with Chudasama losing to a Congress candidate by around 2,000 votes. In 2017, Chudasama had won but the Gujarat High Court had set aside his narrow win after Congress candidate Ashwin Rathod took him to court for wrongful invalidation of votes. But the Supreme Court had stayed the order. A candidate who comes back after the narrowest win of last time – by 170 votes – is Jitu Chaudhary, a tribal leader. Having won on a Congress ticket from the Kaprada (ST) seat, he had defected and won the 2020 by-election on a BJP ticket by over 47,000 votes. Inducted as minister, Chaudhary has been fielded by the BJP from Kaprada.
Matar MLA Kesarisinh Solanki, who won by a margin of 2,406 votes, recently faced allegations of instigating the public flogging of Muslims in his constituency in October. Dropped by the BJP, he joined AAP Thursday. For tribal leader Harshad Vasava, his career has come full circle. In 1998, he had lost from Rajpipla (ST) seat, but won it in 2007 as a BJP candidate with a thin margin. On being denied a ticket this time, he is contesting as an Independent from Nandod seat, that covers the Statue of Unity area, after resigning as president of the BJP Tribal Morcha.
The two Independents who saw narrow wins were Bhupendrasinh Khant in Morva Hadaf (ST) seat and Ratansinh Rathod in Lunawada. Khant, who defeated the BJP candidate by 4,366 votes, and had announced his support to the Congress, died in 2021. In the subsequent by-election, the BJP’s Nimisha Suthar won the seat. Rathod, who had won Lunawada against the BJP by 3,200 votes, joined it soon afterwards and is now a Lok Sabha MP of the party. The Lunawada seat was also won by the BJP in a by-election. AAP, which has been ahead of the BJP and Congress in announcing candidates, has declared 178 of its 182 names already. The Congress has announced about 89.
