Now only 6 months are left in the assembly elections of Gujarat and before that the Congress has suffered a big setback in the last few days. Tribal leader and three-time MLA Ashwin Kotwal has left the Congress and joined the BJP. He is one of the 13 sitting and former MLAs who have left the Congress and joined the BJP since 2017. Kotwal has also been the Chief Whip of the Congress and was running angry for some time. Actually he was hoping to become the leader of the opposition, but the Congress chose another tribal leader Sukhram Rathwa in his place. Kotwal says he was disappointed with the way the Congress worked in tribal areas.
Congress got big success in 2017 on tribal seats
Gujarat Congress Committee spokesperson Manish Doshi said about his leaving the party, ‘This is politics of opportunism and betrayal. People like Kotwal talk about working for the interests of tribals, but join a party that never works for the interests of tribal communities. In fact, the BJP has already started preparing for this election and is making efforts especially to reach out to the tribal community. In fact, the tribal community has played an important role in Gujarat and 27 seats are reserved for them in the assembly. The Congress had won 15 of these in the 2017 assembly elections, while its ally Bharatiya Tribal Party got 2 seats. BJP got 9 seats.
Why BJP has launched a campaign in tribal areas
In such a situation, this time the BJP also wants to make a hold in the tribal belt so that Congress and AAP can be pushed on the back foot. After the change of Congress MLAs, now both BJP and Congress have 12 MLAs each in tribal areas. A senior BJP leader said, “In the 2017 elections, CR Patil had set a target of winning 12 seats in all urban and semi-urban areas of Surat. A similar strategy is being made this time for the forest dwelling areas. Then CR Patil was in charge of Surat, but this time he is handling the responsibility of the state president.
BJP is preparing to repeat the strategy of 2017
How successful Patil’s strategy was in 2017, it can be understood from the fact that the BJP had won all the 12 urban seats in Surat. Apart from this, 14 seats in the district out of total 15 were won. This was the situation when the Patidar agitation took place only one and a half years ago. Now the BJP is facing a similar challenge in the tribal belt and is expecting a repeat of 2017. Even the BJP government had appealed to the Center in the past to stop the Par-Tapi-Narmada project as it would lead to displacement of a large number of people.
BJP leader said – we needed a tribal leader
Kotwal has joined the BJP at a time when Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal has visited tribal areas like Bharuch. He has announced that the Aam Aadmi Party will contest the elections in Gujarat in alliance with the Bharatiya Tribal Party of MLA Chhotu Vasava. The BTP had won two assembly seats in 2017. A BJP leader said, “BJP has been performing well in the seats of Dalit communities. Similarly, there is a need for a strong tribal leader in tribal seats too.