Skip to main content

Key Constituencies: Kapadvanj Vaghela extends support to former BJP minister in his stronghold

Key Constituencies: Kapadvanj

Vaghela extends support to former BJP minister in his stronghold

By Deepak Parvatiyar


Kapadvanj is the constituency that was represented by Shankarsinh Vaghela. This time neither Vaghela nor any one from his new front – Jan Vikalp Morcha, is contesting the seat. This despite the fact that Vaghela has fielded candidates in over 100 seats in the state.

Vaghela was elected as a Congress candidate from Kapadvanj,that falls  in country’s richest Kheda district, in 2012. He had then defeated his nearest BJP rival Kanubhai Dabhi by a margin of 6597 votes. This time, after Vaghela quit the Congress, many had expected him to keep Kapadvanj either for himself or for his son Mahendra. That he totally skipped his constituency is attributed to his support to independent candidate Bimal Shah, a former BJP minister. Shah had quit the BJP after the party renominated Dabhi. In 2012 too, he had quit the BJP over Dabhi’s nomination as the party candidate. At that time he had joined Keshubhai Patel’s Gujarat Parivartan Party, extended support to Vaghela, and rejoined the BJP in March 2014.

Vaghela himself has given an excuse of  having no time to contest the polls and he and Mahendra were busy building the new party. He has publicly extended his support to Shah who had twice won from Kapadvanj on BJP ticket earlier.
Kapadvanj has 45% Kshatriya population and has been a stronghold for Vaghela. He had also represented the Lok Sabha seat from Kapadvanj before it ceased to exist after the implementation of delimitation of parliamentary constituencies in 2008.

That year, too, Shah had quit the BJP after the party had fielded Dabhi. Shah joined Keshubhai Patel’s Gujarat Parivartan Party, extended support to Vaghela, and rejoined the BJP in March 2014.

Besides Kapadvanj, the Vaghela-led front — his Jan VikalpMorcha and its ally All India Hindustan Congress Party — has not fielded candidates in any constituency where the BJP has fielded those Congress MLAs who had joined the BJP following the Rajya Sabha polls in August.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Maharashtra Assembly Polls 2014 : Implications of the End of Alliances

Maharashtra Assembly Polls 2014 : Implications of the End of Alliances By  Deepak Parvatiyar September 27, 2014 The time-tested political alliances — Shiv Sena-Bharatiya Janata Party, and the Indian National Congress-Nationalist Congress Party — collapsed like a pack of cards within a matter of hours in Maharashtra on Thursday, the 26th September. On the surface, the reasons seem common for both the break ups – each one of the alliance partners wanted to have a larger share of the pie and wanted to contest more seats than the other in the ensuing state assembly elections. Performances of Allies in 2009 Maharashtra Assembly Polls In the last assembly elections in 2009, the Congress had emerged as the largest party in the 272-member Maharashtra House by winning 82 of the 169 seats that it had contested. Its coalition partner, the NCP, had then won 62 of the 114 seats it had contested then then. You may also like to read Who will be the next Chief Mi...
Post a Comment
Read more

Indian Elections: Hostage to Corrupt Politicians?

Indian Elections: Hostage to Corrupt Politicians By  Deepak Parvatiyar September 18, 2014 We often talk of corruption pervading the electoral system in our country. We rue the criminals entering politics as we point out that 13 cabinet ministers in the present Union government face various charges of corruption. Further, as many as 186 MPs got elected despite facing criminal charges. In desperation, we expect a messiah a la Anna Hazare to stem the rot. Yet, corrupt and criminal elements manage to win elections, because we, the voters, elect them, even though we are fed up with corruption and criminalisation of politics. Do People Patronise Corrupt Politicians? Given a choice, don’t we voters most of the time opt for a benevolent crook who we perceive as a smart go-getter? Don’t we loathe an idealist simply because (s)he tends to go “too much by the book”?   Ask the Reserve Bank of India Governor, Raghuram Rajan! While  delivering a speech at...
Post a Comment
Read more

WANTED: A Leader

WANTED: A Leader EDITORIAL NEWS Share on facebook Share on blogger Share on linkedin Share on twitter More Sharing Services 31 WANTED: A Leader June 13, 2012 12:15 PM By Deepak Parvatiyar Do we really have any leader in our country who is above religion, caste, and sectarian politics and yet popular with the masses? Can you name any one name that is acceptable to the majority as a mass leader? My question assumes significance in the wake of what we witnessed last week. First, at the Congress Working Committee meeting the delegates raked up the issue of inaccessible ministers (how can they be leaders if they are inaccessible?) Yet, the most important issue was the lack of unanimity even within the ruling coalition itself over the choice of the next Presidential candidate. Thereafter, the BJP’s Gujarat satrap Narendra Modi delivered a power packed punch to claim the scalp of his little-known-much-discussed and elusive bête noire Sanjay Joshi. (Can Modi ...
Post a Comment
Read more