Congress' Geniben Thakor.
Credit: X/@GenibenThakor
Ahmedabad: After drawing a blank in two consecutive Lok Sabha elections, the Congress on Tuesday managed to get a breakthrough in Gujarat by winning one seat out of 25 seats for which polls were held. The Congress managed to stall the BJP juggernaut from hitting a hat-trick of winning all seats in the state.
Firebrand Congress legislator Geniben Thakor defeated her BJP rival Rekhaben Chaudhary by a margin of little over 33,000 votes in a closely fought election from Banaskantha Lok Sabha seat in north Gujarat. The two-time MLA from Vav constituency in the district, Thakor had sought to fame after she started her campaigning through crowdfunding naming it as mameru, token money given to newly married daughters.
The opposition Congress managed to open an account in the state after a gap of ten years. In the 2014 and 2019 elections, the Congress couldn't win even one seat in the home state of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and home minister Amit Shah. In 2009, it had won 11 seats. Even this time, the Congress was in a disarray with its senior leaders such as Arjun Modhwadia and CJ Chavda, Rohan Gupta, among others, switching over to BJP at crucial junctures.
While the BJP launched its campaign claiming to win all seats with highest margin, the Congress lost Surat Lok Sabha seat even without a contest when its candidate Nilesh Kumbhani's nomination was rejected and all other candidates withdrew their nominations in a dramatic turn of events.
However, what gave a lease of life to the Congress was the Kshatriya agitation in wake of union minister Parshottam Rupala's remarks purportedly insulting the community. Despite repeated apologies, the agitation continued and percolated to neighbouring Rajasthan and beyond. Although Rupala won the seat by more than 4.80 lakh vote, agitation had some impact in seats like Banaskantha and Patan where Kshatriyas have sizeable presence.
As results became clearer by the evening, a jubilant Thakor told reporters that she was thankful of Kshatriya community which helped in breaking the "arrogance." She also thanked the voters for electing a "poor daughter" and said that as the voters have helped her win the poll, she would reciprocate by helping them. She also thanked party's national general secretary Priyanka Gandhi who personally campaigned for her and state president Shaktisinh Gohil.
BJP state president C R Paatil termed the lone seat going to Congress as "unfortunate" and said while addressing a press conference at party headquarters at Kamalam in Gandhinagar, "We have been winning all seats for the past two terms. We could have repeated the same but unfortunately due to some dissent it couldn't happen. We will examine where we went wrong and rectify it."
The Congress came closure to defeat BJP at Patan LS seat as well. In the tightly fought contest, BJP's Bharatsinh Dabhi defeated Congress candidate Chandan Thakor by a thin margin of 30,000 votes.
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