Congress leader Ahmed Patel assembles a Dream Team for taking on the BJP in Gujarat

by Guest Sun Oct 22, 2017 4:22 am

In what will cause fresh jitters to the Modi and Shah combine, a loose alliance of the three young Gujarat community leaders - Hardik Patel of the Patidar caste, lawyer-turned-Dalit leader Jignesh Mewani, and 39-year-old OBC leader Alpesh Thakor who will contest the Gujarat election on a Congress ticket - has come to an informal understanding with the Congress.

The "loose alliance" brokered by senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel was put on public display on Saturday when Thakor had a surprise 45-minute meeting with Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi and Ashok Gehlot, Congress Secretary General in charge of Gujarat.

Tomorrow, the alliance will be showcased at a rally organised by OBC Unity Front in Gandhinagar which will be attended by Gandhi. Gehlot told me that Thakor will merge his outfit with the Congress tomorrow as well. This comes after weeks of hardball negotiation, burning the midnight oil and Patel and Gehlot parking themselves in Gujarat...

The BJP's nerviness is evident in the fact that it has pressed into campaign Sushma Swaraj, External Affairs Minister, and Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister. "Do you remember the last time in any election we fought, including Delhi MCD, when we had a campaigner other than Modi? I can't remember when Swaraj last campaigned for the party, other than the Delhi election which we lost," said a BJP leader. Hardik Patel's announcement that he will not contest the election but work against the BJP has also delighted the Congress; he will campaign for its candidates in his Patidar strongholds. In a pre-emptive strike, BJP chief Amit Shah poached 70 of his aides yesterday, but Patel is unmoved. In his characteristic drawl, he told me, "Let him take turn coats. The Patidars will not forgive BJP and he cannot make me defect, can he?''

Mewani, who came in to his own after the leaderless Dalit agitation in Una following the filmed thrashing of four young Dalits, is the third part of the Congress encirclement of the BJP and bid to take Gujarat. Patel and he have come to an understanding and he will also be roped in to campaign for the Congress in constituencies where Dalits play a deciding role.

https://www.ndtv.com/opinion/congress-scores-3-huge-points-in-its-bid-for-gujarat-1765533