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Modi sits comfortable in Gujarat (The Marathi article was published in Pudhari on 6th March 2014)


By Deepak Parvatiyar
The Narendra Modi juggernaut seems unstoppable in the Gujarat strongman’s home state. Yet it is to be seen whether the BJP’s prime ministerial candidate secures all the 26 lok sabha seats from the state for his party or not. In the last Lok Sabha elections in 2009 though, the BJP could win 15 lok sabha seats against the Congress’s 11 seats which was an improvement of one seat from the 2004 elections.
With the Congress in total disarray in the state this time, political observers feel the Aam Admi Party could prevent a Modi clean sweep in the state following grapevines that the political greenhorns may rope in some popular faces such as Amrita Patel –the chairperson of National Dairy Development Board, Anand, SR Rao – the legendary former municipal commissioner of Surat who transformed the city as one of the cleanest cities in the country after the outbreak of the plague there in the 1990s. Sources in the AAP say there are many such names which are doing rounds as possible candidates to embarrass Modi in the elections. Besides, the Aam Admi Party also hopes to wrest the sizeable Muslim votes in the state from the Congress.
“AAP has some influence in the urban pockets where it has certainly emerged as the number two party,” said a political observer. Eminent Gandhian scholar Narayan Desai sees ‘hope’ in the Aam Admi Party and says  he would not support Modi because he has not shown any regret for the violence in 2002 in Ahmedabad.  “Not only that, he conducted a tour in which he addressed about 164 meetings and called it a Gaurav Yatra -- A pilgrimage of pride. Pride of what? Killing of one’s own people (in) his own state? And that is what I can’t support indeed,” he said in a recent interview.
Modi, though, had proved in the last assembly elections that he could win in the state even without fielding a single muslim candidate in the elections.
Not surprising therefore, that today no issue in the state seems bigger than the issue of whether Modi can or cannot be the prime minister of the country. A strong undercurrent of Gujarati asmita has apparently swept Gujarat, where the people are swayed by the idea of Modi, a Gujarati – the first after Morarji Desai (who incidentally was never a popular figure in Gujarat) – being touted as the Prime Minister of India! With less than hundred days remaining for the general elections, the NaMo chant is quite audible in every nook and corner. “Despite all the attack on him after the riots, look how he has finally triumphed,” says an ardent Modi fan. His adulation for Modi is not unfounded.   Modi’s rivals are already off the hook.  The Patels, who had deserted him before the state assembly elections last year are back with the BJP. Modi’s one time mentor turn foe, Keshubhai Patel has announced his retirement from active politics. His political outfit, Gujarat Parivartan Party, has merged with the BJP, and his son Bharat Patel is likely to contest on the lotus symbol. How Modi  has turned the table on his arch rival and the Congress leader of the Opposition in the state assembly, Shankarsinh Vaghela, too speaks volumes of his political acumen this elections.  He has deftly engineered a split in the state congress and lured many of the congress MLAs loyal to Vaghela – who himself was once a BJP face before he revolted against the Modi – Keshubhai duo to split the BJP in the 1990s. Vaghela had then formed his own Rashtriya Janata Party which finally merged with the Congress.  
Today time seems to have taken a full circle. In a huge setback to the Congress ahead of the Lok Sabha elections, five of its sitting legislators have quit the party in the last few days for the BJP to rally behind Narendra Modi. In the 182-member House where the BJP enjoys a brute majority of 119, the resignations change little but clearly indicate that Modi continues to have a firm grip on state politics even as he travels across the country campaigning for the general elections. In fact so confident seems Modi on his home turf that he hasn’t really launched his formal election rallies in Gujarat yet. However, he is seen focussing more on meetings with party workers – the most recent being with the youth workers of the party at a stadium in Ahmedabad.
For over two decades, Gujarat has remained a BJP stronghold. The party has done reasonably well in every Lok Sabha election after its disastrous performance in the 1984 Lok sabha elections, irrespective of the fact that it came to power in Gujarat for the first time only in the mid nineties. Even in 1989, when the Janata Dal was at the peak of its popularity, to JD’s 13 seats, the BJP came a close second with 10. The Congress could get only three parliamentary seats from Gujarat that time.
Ever since, the electoral graph of the BJP has remained in two digits in Gujarat. But with a Gujarati pitching for the prime minister’s post, will entire Gujarat stand behind its Narendrabhai to ensure a BJP victory in all of the 26 parliamentary constituencies in the state, is to be seen.
(The writer is a New Delhi based senior journalist)


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