In BJP-Ruled Gujarat, Congress Makes Gains In Civic Polls

Mangalore Today News Network

Ahmedabad, Dec 02, 2015:  The BJP has brushed off some early competition from the Congress to take a commanding lead in all six major municipal corporations in Gujarat, where votes are being counted in crucial local body elections today.

The BJP also continues to dominate other urban centres and will particularly celebrate winning the Nagar Palika or municipality in Viramgam, the home-town of 22-year-old politician Hardik Patel, who is leading a massive agitation for reservation for Patels.

The Congress is, however, making major gains in rural Gujarat, in the best news the opposition party has had in years in the state. Of 31 district panchayats, it is leading in 18. The BJP had won 30 last time.  

These civic elections are seen as an acid test for Chief Minister Anandiben Patel of the BJP. They are the first major elections in Gujarat since she took over as chief minister, handpicked by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to replace him as he moved to Delhi after the national election last May.

Hardik Patel and other leaders of his agitation had appealed to the Patels or Paatidars, a wealthy and influential community for long considered a BJP support base, to vote against the BJP for rejecting their demand for reservation in government jobs and colleges.

The wives of two Hardik Patel aides have contested the civic elections as Congress candidates and several others have contested as Independents. The Congress, which has been reduced to spectator status in the state for the last two decades, hopes to cash in on the Patel backlash and make some sort of a comeback.

The BJP at present controls not just the six corporations - in Ahmedabad, Surat, Bhavnagar, Vadodara, Rajkot and Jamnagar - but also most other local bodies in rural and semi-urban areas.

Under PM Modi, then Gujarat chief minister, it had also won 115 of the 182 assembly seats in the last state elections in 2012 and swept all 26 Lok Sabha seats in the national election last year.

 

Courtesy: NDTV