Moderate to heavy polling continues in Gujarat’s 89 assembly constituencies, campaigning is at its peak for the remaining seats in Gujarat with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, UP CM Yogi Adityanath and Home Minister Amit Shah addressing rallies and roadshows are doing.
At a rally in Panchmahal district, Modi referred to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge’s ‘Raavan’ remark against him. He said, ‘I respect Kharge ji but he has to follow the orders of the party high command. He was forced to say that Modi has 100 heads like Ravana… Such derogatory words are an insult to the people of Gujarat, who brought me up on this earth. Modi said, ‘There is only one way to teach a lesson to the Congress. Vote for BJP by pressing lotus button (on EVM). Whenever they throw mud at us, our lotus will bloom.
Scheduled Tribes and Patidars constitute a major chunk of voters in 89 constituencies in 19 districts that go to polls today. In the last election, BJP won 48 seats and Congress won 38 seats. Five years ago, the Congress did well in tribal areas and the Patidar reservation movement hurt the BJP badly, but this time the scenario has changed.
The BJP has campaigned vigorously among tribal voters this time, and its leaders are hopeful that the AAP can cut into the Congress vote base in the Saurashtra-Kutch region. AAP leaders were so eager to find winnable candidates that they gave tickets to candidates with criminal background.
In its latest report, the Association of Democratic Reforms (ADR) said that out of 1,621 candidates in Gujarat, 330 have criminal cases against them. AAP tops the list with 61 candidates having criminal background. AAP has fielded candidates on 181 seats. This means one out of three AAP candidates has a criminal background. Congress is second with 61 candidates with criminal background. Therefore, one out of three Congress candidates has a criminal background as well. There are 32 BJP candidates against whom criminal cases are registered.
Of the 330 candidates with criminal background, 192 have charges of murder, attempt to murder and rape. AAP is on top with 43 such candidates, Congress is second with 28 candidates and BJP has 25 such candidates.
Campaigning is also on for bypolls in some key seats in Uttar Pradesh, where polling will be held on Monday, and for the Delhi Municipal Corporation elections, where polling will be held on Sunday. Many Chief Ministers and Union Ministers of BJP are campaigning for the party in Delhi.
UTTAR PRADESH:
In the western UP assembly constituency of Khatauli, UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath while addressing rallies reminded people how crime was rampant during the previous Samajwadi Party rule. He compared SP’s ‘mafia raj’ with Taliban’s rule in Afghanistan.
Yogi said, in those days women were afraid to step out of the house, fearing molestation, girls shied away from going to school-college, Hindu businessmen were running away and passengers were being looted, but now under BJP’s rule this Criminals live in the area. in fear “The law of the country has been fully implemented,” Yogi said. The Chief Minister recalled how during the SP regime, farmers’ cattle were looted and killed by criminals in western UP.
I remember during the UP assembly elections earlier this year, the Samajwadi Party and Rashtriya Lok Dal alliance were expecting a clean sweep in western UP, but the law and order issue gave BJP an edge and voters preferred Yogi . No one can deny that there has been a lot of improvement in law and order in UP under Yogi’s rule. Yogi said on Tuesday that if his police had not taken strict action against the mafias and criminals, the situation could not have improved.
Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav has made it a battle of prestige by giving ticket to his wife Dimple Yadav in the Mainpuri Lok Sabha by-election after the death of SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav. Akhilesh is reminding the voters about the legacy of Mulayam Singh Yadav’s family. Akhilesh Yadav and his uncle Shivpal Yadav appeared together in a rally in Jaswant Nagar and sought votes for the party. While Akhilesh touched the feet of his uncle, Shivpal Yadav told the voters that this by-election is a matter of prestige for the Yadav family.
Mainpuri has been a stronghold of the Yadav family and if Akhilesh loses from this seat like Azamgarh, it will be a big blow for him. His uncle Shivpal Yadav asked voters to address Akhilesh as “Chhote Netaji” from now on. It was the late Mulayam Singh Yadav who received the honorific title of ‘Netaji’ when he was alive.
BJP leader and UP Deputy CM Keshav Prasad Maurya reminded voters that Akhilesh Yadav had insulted his uncle Shivpal several months ago. Samajwadi Party leader Ram Gopal Yadav on Tuesday submitted a memorandum to the Election Commission alleging that names of Muslim voters have been struck off from the voter list in Mainpuri. He demanded the removal of the District Magistrate and Superintendent of Police of Etawah-Mainpuri.
Another major fight is taking place in Rampur, where the Assembly seat has now fallen vacant after SP leader Azam Khan was sentenced to three years in jail and stripped of his membership for a provocative speech.
Addressing a rally on Tuesday, Azam Khan alleged that the BJP was planning to disenfranchise Muslim voters. In a taunt, he said, after Rampur results are out on December 8, ‘Abdul (a common Muslim name) will sweep the floor for the BJP’. He said, ‘All the contractors and rich Muslims who could not give account of their assets left our party and joined BJP. Qureshi, who had 50-50 cases of cow slaughter pending against him, has joined the BJP. All the traitors left me and now only the faithful are left.
Azam Khan never dreamed that he or his candidate would lose the election from Rampur, but Yogi ensured that his candidate was defeated in the Rampur Lok Sabha by-election. The current assembly by-election is a matter of prestige for him. Azam Khan is playing the emotional card by reminding voters what he did for them.
Delhi:
There are two days left in the election campaign for the Delhi Municipal Corporation elections. All parties have fielded their star campaigners. Already BJP president JP Nadda, AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal and other top leaders have held several roadshows.
Several BJP chief ministers Shivraj Chouhan, Pushkar Singh Dhami and Jairam Thakur and Union ministers Nitin Gadkari, Anurag Thakur, Bhupendra Yadav, Hardeep Puri and Jyotiraditya Scindia campaigned on Tuesday. Scindia said, the Aam Aadmi Party should now change its name to ‘Khas Aadmi Party’ as its minister Satyendar Jain is living a life of luxury in jail. Scindia questioned why he was not being sacked by Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal.
Addressing an election meeting, Union Road Transport and Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari said that the Center has done a lot for the development of Delhi. Better roads and highways are being built to connect the national capital to other cities.
Gadkari announced that from January next year, the journey from Delhi to Jaipur, Dehradun and Haridwar will be completed in two hours. He said that the journey from Delhi to Chandigarh can be completed in two and a half hours, from Amritsar in four hours, from Srinagar in eight hours and from Mumbai in just 12 hours.
Addressing a press conference, Union Urban Affairs and Housing Minister Hardeep Singh Puri, all BJP MPs from Delhi promised that all unauthorized colonies in Delhi would be regularized and slum dwellers would be given pucca houses.
BJP has made the MCD election interesting by involving its Chief Ministers and Union Ministers. There was a time when no one imagined that the Chief Minister and Union Ministers would address street meetings for the municipal elections of Delhi.
This change has been possible because of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. This is his unique style and he fights every election with full force. This has worried Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. Kejriwal on Tuesday asked how many more chief ministers and Union ministers would campaign in Delhi. Kejriwal, on his part, has deployed all his ministers and Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann for campaigning in Delhi.
The BJP made a new allegation on AAP on Tuesday. Party spokesperson Sambit Patra alleged that the development plan prepared by Kejriwal for Delhi by forming Mohalla Sabha is completely fake. He alleged that Rs 20 crore was given for development works in 12 assembly constituencies, but no one knew what happened to those funds. He sought an answer on the fate of the missing Rs 20 crore that was distributed.
Kejriwal has now changed sides. A few weeks ago, he was alleging that the BJP was buying MLAs by distributing huge amounts of cash in different states. But when the BJP hit back and asked him for an answer about scams in his government, Kejriwal said, “I only talk about development, I talk about health and education.”
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