With 48 seats, Saurashtra region holds key to power in Gujarat

Ahmedabad: Gujarat's Saurashtra region, which accounts for 48 out of the total 182 Assembly seats in the state with a sizable Patidar and Other Backward Class (OBC) population, has the potential to tilt the power game in favour of or against the ruling BJP or opposition Congress in the next month's elections.

In the 2017 Assembly polls, the Congress had bagged 28 seats in this region, improving its previous election's tally of 15 and helping it restrict the BJP's victory count to 99. Political observers attributed the grand old party's impressive show in the region to the 2015 Patidar community's quota agitation that targeted the BJP government.

But improving the numbers or at least keeping them intact in the next month's Assembly polls would be a challenge for the Congress as unlike the reservation stir, there is no issue that would serve as an "emotional ground to unite" this time. Besides, Arvind Kejriwal-led AAP can also pose a hurdle in the way, observers feel.

The ruling BJP, which could win just 19 seats in the region in the 2017 elections as against 30 in 2012, is also making concerted efforts to regain its lost ground by poaching

Congress MLAs.

There are 11 districts in this region - Surendranagar, Morbi, Rajkot, Jamnagar, Devbhumi Dwarka, Porbandar, Junagadh, Gir Somnath, Amreli, Bhavnagar and Botad. In the 2017 Assembly, BJP had failed to open an account in three of these districts - Morbi, Gir Somnath and Amreli.

For the Congress, which has been out of power in Gujarat for more than two decades, it is important that it sustains its 2017 performance in Saurashtra in order to regain the lost ground in the state. But this is not going to be easy for it given the fact that the 2015 Patidar quota agitation that united Patidars against the ruling BJP is missing this time, the political observers said.

Furthermore, Hardik Patel, the most prominent Patidar agitation leader who had joined the Congress in 2019 and was appointed its working president, snapped ties with the party earlier this year and joined the BJP which has even fielded him from Viramgam seat this time. The AAP, which is for the first time contesting on all 182 seats in Gujarat, can play spoilsport for the Congress as the younger generation of the Patidar community is seen supporting the Arvind Kejriwal-led outfit, experts said.

The BJP is seen compensating for any lack of support from the Patidar community with the OBC.