Prime Minister Narendra Modi with Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel during a public meeting, ahead of the third phase of Lok Sabha elections.
Credit: PTI Photo
Ahmedabad: Gujarat will be casting votes on Tuesday for 25 Lok Sabha seats as the Surat seat has already gone to the BJP without any contest in the high-stake election for the ruling party, which is under pressure to repeat its success of winning all the seats for a record third time. The Congress, on the other hand, is hoping for a breakthrough after its humiliating defeat in the 2022 Assembly polls and a series of defections at crucial junctures.
Unusual to its character, the BJP faced intense dissent within the party over ticket distribution and had to change two candidates — one in Sabarkantha and another one in Vadodara. While it was busy dousing similar dissent elsewhere, the Kshatriya agitation eclipsed BJP's poll pitch of winning all seats with the biggest margin. Seats such as Banaskantha, Surendranagar, Patan, Sabarkantha, and Anand are being contested on caste lines by both parties.
The Kshatriya agitation following a controversial remark by its Rajkot candidate and Union minister Parshottam Rupala took away the limelight from the BJP. The agitation left many BJP candidates embarrassed due to disruption, sloganeering and resignations by community leaders. These scenes were a reminder of what the BJP faced during the 2017 Assembly election in the wake of Patidar agitation, though with much less intensity.
Despite this, the party has remained upbeat and claimed that the agitation only consolidated its position among other dominant caste groups like the Patidars, Scheduled Castes and Other Backward Classes. The saffron party claims the agitation won't have any impact on the electoral outcome.
For Congress, on the other hand, winning even one seat will be considered a huge moral booster. After suffering a humiliating defeat in the December 2022 polls which reduced its strength to just 17 in the 182-strong Assembly, the grand old party kept on suffering a series of embarrassing situations leading up to the Lok Sabha polls. Four of its MLAs, including veteran leader Arjun Modhwadia and CJ Chavda, switched over to the BJP leaving the party high and dry at crucial periods.
The party was left embarrassed in the middle of the campaigning as well when its Surat candidate Nilesh Kumbhani withdrew his nomination at the last minute, making the BJP's candidate win the seat without a contest. Despite being squeezed by the BJP every now and then, the Congress claims to pose challenges to the BJP in several seats.