NEW DELHI: All eyes in the Gujarat Assembly elections this time are on the 15 seats on which BJP candidates had won by securing over one lakh votes in 2012 polls.
These seats also include the ones won by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, BJP chief Amit Shah and former chief minister Anandiben Patel.
It would be interesting to see as to whether the ruling party would be able to continue their winning streak with the same overwhelming margin or the Opposition Congress would wrest them from the saffron party.
Prime Minister and the then chief minister Narendra Modi, Mr Amit Shah and Ms Anandiben Patel had contested from Maninagar, Naranpur and Ghatlodia, respectively and secured over one lakh votes.
This time, however, they are not in the fray. Mr Modi is the Prime Minister while Mr Shah has been brought in the Upper House of Parliament by the party and Ms Patel has refused to contest election, as she has turned 75, the age bar set by the party for contesting elections.
This time, the party has fielded Sureshbhai Patel on Maninagar seat, the seat vacated by the Prime Minister, against Congress’ Shweta Brahmbhatt. She is a foreign-returned first time candidate.
For the Naranpur seat, the ruling party has announced the name of Kaushik Patel to take on Congress’ fresh face Nitin Patel. In 2012, Mr Shah had emerged victorious against his rival Jitubhai Patel.
Former chief minister Anandiben Patel had got over 1.54 lakh votes and routed Rameshbhai Patel of the grand old party from Ghatlodia Assembly seat. However, both the parties have changed their candidates this time.
The BJP is trying its luck with Bhupendra Patel, and the Congress with Shashikant Patel.
From Vejalpur constituency, Kishore Singh Chauhan of BJP got elected to the Assembly by receiving over 1.13 lakh votes and defeated his nearest rival of Congress Murtza Khan Pathan.
Mr Chauhan is lucky enough to get ticket this time, but the Congress is banking upon on Mihir Shah.
Rakesh Shah has been again nominated by the BJP from Eliisbridge seat to face Congress’s Vijay Dave. Last time, Mr Shah received over 1.30 lakh votes against Kamlesh Kumar.
Mr Kumar had got 30,000 votes. On the Amraiwadi seat, Bipinbhai Ghadvi of Congress had managed to gain 43,000 votes while BJP’s Hashmukhbhai Patel fetched over one lakh votes.
The Congress has fielded Arvind Singh Chauhan in place of Mr Ghadvi. In Sabarmati, BJP’s Arvind Patel had defeated his rival Bharat Kumar Patel with a huge margin of 60,000. The BJP had received over one lakh votes in the last election.
The Congress has changed its face this time and fielded Jitubhai Patel. Besides, Bachubhai Khabad, Manisha Vakil, Jitendra Sukhadiya, Mukeshbhai Patel, Prafulbhai Panseria, Harsh Sanghvi, Rajendra Patel and Mangubhai Patel also gained more than one lakh votes in 2012 elections.
The Congress party was able to receive more than one lakh votes on only one seat?Vansda, on which Chhanabhai Chaudhary had defeated BJP’s Nareshbhai Patel .
The 182 seats state Assembly is going to vote in two phases — December 9 and December 14. The result will be declared on December 18. (agencies)
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