Janjivan Bureau / New Delhi : The BJP today released its first list of 70 candidates for the Gujarat elections, including five Congress rebels and 49 sitting MLAs.
The state’s ruling party has fielded 16 fresh faces in its first list for elections to the 182-member Gujarat Assembly, to be held in two phases on December 9 and 14.
The five Congress rebels who have been given tickets are Raghavji Patel, Dharmendrasinh Jadeja, Ramsinh Parmar, Mansinh Chauhan and C K Raolji. They had supported the BJP during the presidential election and during Congress leader Ahmed Patel’s Rajya Sabha election.
The party has named Chief Minister Vijaybhai Rupani as its candidate from Rajkot West. Deputy Chief Minister Nitinbhai Patel will contest from Mahesana and state party president Jitubhai Vaghani from Bhavnagar West.
Of the 70, 17 are Patels, 18 OBCs, three SCs and 11 STs, party sources said. A majority of OBC candidates are Thakores followed by Kolis, the sources added. The names were finalised by BJP’s Central Election Committee, which met on Wednesday.
The meeting, chaired by BJP president Amit Shah, was attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Rajnath Singh and Minister of External Affairs Sushma Swaraj among others, party leaders said.
The first list of nominations also indicates an attempt on the part of the BJP to instill confidence among the state party leadership with 15 ministers from the cabinet of Vijay Rupani having been named from their respective seats to seek re-election. These ministers include Shankar Chaudhary (Vav), Keshaji Chauhan (Deodar), Dilip Thakor (Chanasma), Bhupendrasinh Chudasama (Dholka), Jayesh Radadiya, Chiman Shapariya (Jamjodhpur), Jashabhai Barad (Somnath), Atmaram Parmar (Gadhada), Jaydrathsinh Parmar, Bachubhai Khabad, Rajendra Trivedi (Raopura), Shabdsharan Tadvi (Nandod), Ishvarsinh Patel (Ankleshwar), and Ganpat Vasava (Mangrol).
The party has, however, not nominated only two sitting MLAs. Denying ticket to sitting MLA from Wadhwan, Varsha Doshi, the party has fielded Dhanjibhai Patel in her place.. Similarly, Bhavna Makwana has not been repeated from Mahuva and Raghavji Makwana has been given ticket.
Another interesting candidate of the party is Dilip Sanghani, a stalwart of co-operative sector, who is running from Dhari constituency of Saurashtra. In 2012, Sanghani had contested from Amreli constituency and lost to Congress’s Paresh Dhanani. Sanghani has once served as cabinet minister in the Gujarat cabinet when Narendra Modi was chief minister.
Ketan Inamdar, who had won from Savli constituency of Vadodara as an independent candidate in 2012, has joined BJP and is now the party’s nominee from the same seat.
The other important inclusion in the list is Koli strongman Parshottam Solanki and his brother Hira Solanki. Parshottam is running from Bhavnagar Rual and Hira from Rajula constituency.
Out of the 70 names, 42 are of seats that are going to polls in the first phase (December 9) and 28 are for those constituencies that go to polls on December 14 in the second phase.
