AHMADABAD: The BJP on Tuesday swept elections to six municipal corporations in Gujarat by winning 483 of the 576 seats, the results coming as a relief for the party amid the ongoing farmers’ agitation and issues like rise in fuel prices and unemployment.
The ruling party retained power in all the six municipal corporations in the state — Ahmedabad, Surat, Vadodara, Rajkot, Jamnagar and Bhavnagar. The polls were held on February 21. The main opposition Congress got a drubbing, winning only 55 seats and failed even to open account in Surat. On the other hand, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) put up an impressive show by winning 27 seats, all in Surat, and emerged as the main Opposition in the Surat Municipal Corporation. The AAP had for the first time fielded 470 candidates across all the six corporations.
The BJP won 159 of 192 seats in Ahmedabad, 68 of 72 in Rajkot, 50 of 64 in Jamnagar, 44 of 52 seats in Bhavnagar, 69 of 76 in Vadodara and 93 of the 120 seats in Surat.
The Congress won 25 seats in Ahmedabad, four in Rajkot, 11 in Jamnagar, eight in Bhavnagar and seven in Vadodara.
Asaduddin Owaisi’s AIMIM, which also contested local body polls in Gujarat for the first time, won seven seats in Ahmedabad’s Muslim-dominated Jamalpur and Maktampura wards. The BJP had won 389 seats and Congress 176 across these municipal corporations in 2016.
Top BJP leaders, including PM Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah and party chief JP Nadda, hailed the people of Gujarat and their cadres for the victory.
With the Assembly elections due next year, the polls are being seen as indicator of the voters’ mood. In a series of tweets, the PM thanked Gujarat for showing “unwavering faith towards politics of development and good governance”. Coming amid the ongoing farmers’ agitation, the BJP is viewing the results as an endorsement of the three controversial laws, especially after the drubbing it received in the Punjab local body polls.
Nadda attributed the “historic win” to the “complete faith” of all sections, including villages, poor, farmers, traders, women and youth in PM Modi.