Union Minister for Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying Parshottam Rupala.
| Photo Credit: ANI
Rajkot will witness a clash of old rivals after a niche of 21 years when all Lok Sabha seats in Gujarat — barring Surat, the place the BJP nominee has gained unopposed — go to polls in the third section on May 7.
The BJP has fielded Union Minister for Fisheries, Animal Husbandry and Dairying Parshottam Rupala in opposition to Paresh Dhanani of the Congress. Both candidates are native to Amreli district however are new faces in Rajkot. Mr. Dhanani is taking up Mr. Rupala after defeating him by a margin of over two lakh votes from the Amreli seat in the 2002 Assembly ballot.
“Since then, Mr. Rupala has somewhat taken a back seat in contesting elections. After his loss, he was appointed the State BJP chief and later nominated as a Rajya Sabha MP,” Mr. Dhanani informed The Hindu.
Though the Congress chief misplaced the Amreli seat in 2007 to the BJP’s Dilip Sanghani, present chairman of IFFCO and former Minister of Agriculture in Gujarat, he contested once more in opposition to Mr. Sanghani and gained in 2012. He went on to retain the seat until 2022. “I have contested the Assembly elections five times, won thrice, and lost twice. I also contested the 2019 Lok Sabha poll and lost to the BJP,” he mentioned.
Paresh Dhanani of the Congress.
| Photo Credit:
Vijay Soneji
Mr. Dhanani, who was appointed the youngest normal secretary of the Indian Youth Congress between 2013 and 2017, identified that since 1990, the Congress has by no means come to energy in Gujarat and that Rajkot is a stronghold of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh.
Rajkot is dotted with hoardings of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Mr. Rupala promising speedy growth like a swanky new worldwide airport, digital India, entry to faucet water, a six-lane freeway connecting Rajkot to Ahmedabad and past, and a brand new All India Institute of Medical Sciences.
While the BJP is enjoying the infrastructure growth card to woo the enterprise group in Rajkot, Mr. Rupala has irked the Kshatriyas in Gujarat by making allegedly derogatory remarks in opposition to the group whereas interacting with members of the Dalit group not too long ago.
Voter outreach
Since the vote share of the Kshatriyas is restricted in the seat, which has 22 lakh voters, their dissent is unlikely to dent the BJP’s prospects. Yet, to keep away from defeat, Mr. Rupala has been actively campaigning in the constituency to attain out to communities such because the Brahm Kshatriyas, Darzis, and Mochis.
In a gathering of the Darzi Samaj final month, Mr. Rupala addressed a crowd of 5,000 BJP supporters. After a night of campaigning, dinner was served to those that attended the assembly. The BJP chief focused the Congress over skipping the inauguration of the Ram temple in Ayodhya.
According to Mr. Dhanani, the battle this time will not be over changing into an MP, however defending constitutional rights. “There is inflation, slump in trade, and unemployment, but to make people forget these core issues, they [BJP] divide people on religious and caste lines during every election. If common people raise their voice for their rights, then they are threatened, false cases are slapped on them. In a State that gave birth to Mahatma Gandhi and Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, who talked about unity in diversity, today those who have stepped on the Constitution are destroying the country’s unity in diversity with their arrogance of power,” he mentioned.