All the Congress MLAs that had defected to BJP in recent past managed to get reelected to state legislative assembly in the by elections held along with general elections for Lok Sabha, for which results were announced on Thursday. With this the strength of BJP in state legislature has risen to 104 from 99, that it had won during general elections for state legislative assembly in 2017. On the other hand, Congress' strength has dropped from 77 to 72 now. Former Congress MLA Kunvarji Bavaliya had defected to BJP and won a by-election in Jasdan.
Raghavji Patel of BJP defeated his nearest rival Jayanti Sabhaya of Congress party by a margin of 33,022 votes in Jamanagar – rural constituency. Patel bagged 88,254 votes against 55,232 won by Sabhaya. Patel had joined Congress party after Rajya Sabha elections held in August 2017. However, he lost to Vallabh Dharaviya of Congress in the general elections for Gujarat legislative assembly in 2017. However, Dharaviya resigned as a MLA in March this year and defected to BJP, which paved the way for Patel's re-election.
Parsotam Sabariya, contesting from Dhrangadhara assembly constituency as a BJP candidate defeated his rival Dinesh Patel from Congress by a margin of 34,280votes. Sabariya got 99,252 votes, while Patel bagged 64,972 votes. Sabariya had won from the same seat in 2017 general elections for state assembly but defected to BJP in March after resigning as MLA.
BJP candidate Jawahar Chavda from Manavadar constituency defeated Congress candidate Arvind Ladani by a margin of 9,759 votes. Chavda bagged 78,491 votes, while Ladani got 68,732 votes. Chavda had also defected from Congress to BJP in March and was soon made a cabinet minister.
Asha Patel, former MLA from Unjha regained her seat as a BJP candidate defeating Kanti Patel of Congress by a margin of 23,006 votes. They got 77,105 votes and 54,099 votes respectively. In 2017, Asha had emerged as a giant killer by defeating Narayan Lallu Patel, a veteran cooperative leader from Unjha. As a part of strengthening Patidar vote bank, BJP had wooed Asha and she defected to BJP.
WEAKENED FORCE
- Ahmedabad-based political analyst and a former faculty of Political Science at Gujarat University, Dinesh Shukla said that BJP leadership has outsmarted Congress leadership and these turncoats had defected as they saw Congress party weakening.
- 72 – The number of assembly seats Congress hold. Earlier they had 77 seats
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