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Another rout looms large for Congress in south Gujarat seats

Political watchers said they are expecting a good fight between former union minister Tushar Chaudhary, who is facing a battle of political survival, and MP & BJP candidate Prabhu Vasava from Bardoli ST.

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The Congress party faces tough electoral battles in majority of the Lok Sabha seats in the state, but none as tough as the south Gujarat region, where another clean sweep by the BJP is extremely likely.

The south Gujarat region comprises Bharuch, Bardoli ST, Surat, Navsari and Valsad ST seats. Of the five, BJP win in Surat, Navsari and Bharuch, is almost a given, while the Congress may put up a semblance of a fight in the remaining two seats.

Surat is one of the safest seats for BJP in the state, having won it in each of the eight elections since 1989. The party’s candidate Darshana Jardosh had won in 2014 with a margin of 5.33 lakh votes, and a win against Congress’s Ashok Adhevada, who is a Patidar from Saurashtra, looks like a certainty. A local Congress leader admitted that they are working to bring down the margin of the loss.

Navsari seat, which BJP candidate CR Patil had won with a huge margin of 5.58 lakh votes in 2014, also looks like almost in the bag for the party. This is even though there were demands to drop Patil and to field a Koli candidate. The Congress has fielded Dharmesh Patel, who is a Koli, in the hope of getting the community’s support in the coastal belt, but he is unlikely to pose a major challenge for Patil. Four of the seven constituencies that form the Navsari Lok Sabha seat are a part of Surat city, which are traditionally BJP strongholds.

Bharuch is one of the few seats in the state where a triangular contest is likely. Having won it nine consecutive times since 1989, the BJP has a clear edge here. The party repeated five-term MP Mansukh Vasava as its candidate, while Congress fielded Youth Congress leader Sherkhan Pathan as its nominee. However, MLA and Bharatiya Tribal Party leader Chhotu Vasava’s candidature is what has made the contest interesting. Vasava had sought Congress’s support for his candidature to make it a direct fight between him and BJP, but the plan didn’t work out, leading a miffed Vasava to also put up candidates in some other tribal dominated seats.

Political watchers said they are expecting a good fight between former union minister Tushar Chaudhary, who is facing a battle of political survival, and MP & BJP candidate Prabhu Vasava from Bardoli ST. Vasava had trumped Chaudhary with a margin of 1.24 lakh votes when they had faced off in 2014, and he also holds an edge this time, but Chaudhary said he was confident of reversing the result.

A local Congress leader said the party had managed to bring down the deficit in seven assembly seats that form Bardoli LS seat to below 12,000 votes in the 2017 assembly elections.

“He can win from Bardoli is Tushar bhai manages to mend fences with other party leaders,” he said.

Similarly, Congress fielded senior MLA Jitu Chaudhari against MP and BJP candidate KC Patel from Valsad ST seat, which is considered a bellwether. Patel had won in 2014 with a margin of 2.08 lakh votes, and even though Chaudhari just scraped through from Kaprada seat in 2017 polls with a margin of 170 votes, the BJP’s overall lead in seven assembly seats of Valsad declined to 1.39 lakh votes.

“It is a huge margin to erase, but Jitu Chaudhary is one of the strong tribal leaders from the region, and will put up a good fight,” said a watcher.

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