BJP keen to drop 18% legislators for Gujarat polls, convenes meet to finalise on candidates

Some of Gujarat’s key ministers as well as senior leaders, including former chief minister Vijay Rupani and former deputy chief minister Nitin Patel, announced that they will not contest the upcoming assembly elections in Gujarat on a day when the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Central Election Committee convened a meeting to decide the names of candidates.

Sources told DH that the party is keen on dropping as many as 13 to 18 per cent of the legislators, to combat anti-incumbency, where it is looking to come back for a seventh term.

The state unit of the party said that they worked on something called the People Contact Index, a feedback system from the ground, which helped them decide on the names. The Index, leaders said, looked at the connect that legislators had with their constituents and looked at the number of meetings they held with locals.

Also Read: Yet another Opinion Poll predicts saffron victory in Gujarat, Himachal

Prime Minister Narendra Modi was part of the meeting, which was held at the party headquarters at Deen Dayal Upadhyay Marg. Also in attendance were party president JP Nadda, home minister Amit Shah, Gujarat CM Bhupendrabhai Patel, state president CR Patil, Maharashtra deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis, union minister Bhupendra Yadav and Sarbananda Sonowal, former Karnataka CM BS Yediyurappa, and other CRC members Iqbal Singh Lalpura, Satyanaran Jatiya and K Laxman, among others.

Party leaders said that a list of most of the candidates could be expected by late Wednesday night.

Other senior leaders that declared that they will not contest include former ministers Bhupdendrasinh Chudasama, Pradeepsinh Jadeja, Saurabh Patel, RC Faldu, Vibhavri Dave and Vallabh Kakdia. These declarations came amid speculations that several legislators will not be given tickets by the BJP

Central command

Election to the 182-member assembly will take place in two phases — on December 1 and December 5. While on December 1, polling will take place on 89 seats, on December 5 polling will take place on 93 seats. Modi has been a three-term chief minister from the state from 2001 to 2014.