AHMEDABAD: The BJP has boldly and adroitly gone all out to squelch whatever the anti-incumbency imprints it could have seen while selecting its candidates for the two-phase Gujarat polls due Dec 1 and 5. The party has dropped as many as 38 sitting MLAs, including some of the ministers of the incumbent and previous governments.
Those allowed an honourable exit include a host of former ministers, including ex-CM Vijay Rupani. The others are former deputy CM Nitin Patel, former home minister Pradipsinh Jadeja and former education minister Bhupendrasinh Chudasma. However, leaders like Saurabh Patel, RC Faldu, Kaushik Patel, Rajendra Trivedi, and Brijesh Merja, were simply benched out.
Sources say those who publicly claimed voluntary retirement, such as former deputy CM Nitin Patel and Pradip Singh Jadeja, in fact, lobbied hard for the ticket only to be met with a firm ‘no’ from the top leadership.
The BJP has tacitly admitted that the Rupani-led government’s response to the Covid pandemic was less than efficient. Last year the party went for the harshest measure ever: it changed the entire state cabinet, including the CM. That was a precursor to the fever pitch campaign that the party kicked off early this year.
Rupani and Nitin Patel went to the extent of publishing letters saying they did not want to contest the polls even before the party nominations were announced. However, they sent out a message that the party had not crossed their names.
Political analyst Dilip Patel says Gujarat was one of the badly hit states during the second wave of Covid-19. There was a shortage of medical oxygen, medicines, hospital beds, and overall management. Even the Gujarat High Court remarked that the then Vijay Rupani government’s response was “not satisfactory.”
“Modi and Amit Shah have projected the state’s development as a model across India. But the Rupani government dented the image. That’s why Rupani and most of his team have been deprived of the party nomination,” says Dilip Patel.
A former party leader said people generally don’t oppose the party’s policies. “In Gujarat, Rupani replaced Anandiben Patel and Bhupendra Patel replaced Rupani. The party knows people could get angry at leaders but not with the party.”
The electoral performance under Rupani’s watch was also a factor. The party failed to touch the three-figure mark in the 182-member Gujarat Assembly. The last time, the BJP won less than 100 seats in the state was in 1990.
To deflect people’s outrage over the Morbi bridge disaster, the BJP has dropped from the nomination list Disaster Management Minister Rajendra Trivedi and Labour and Employment Minister Brijesh Merja, the MLA from Morbi.
‘Dismal performance’ during Covid peak
The BJP has admitted that the Rupani-led government’s response to the Covid pandemic was less than efficient. There was a shortage of medical oxygen, medicines, hospital beds, and overall management. Last year, the party went for the harshest measure ever: it changed the entire state cabinet, including the CM. That was a precursor to the fever pitch campaign that the party kicked off early this year