Gandhinagar: The recalcitrance amongst the Patidars still continues to give nightmares to the ruling BJP in Gujarat with little change from the State Assembly polls of 2017 to the Lok Sabha elections 2019.
After news spread like wildfire that a large chunk of Patidars settled abroad are organising a campaign against BJP national chief Amit Shah who is contesting the elections from Gandhinagar, the Gujarat BJP swung into action with an announcement that members of the Overseas Friends of BJP would be campaigning in the rural areas in support of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
In a press note issued in Ahmedabad, it was pointed out that a team of 277 NRGs from USA, Mauritius, Canada, Australia, UK New Zealand, Uganda and Africa were touring the state campaigning for the BJP.
BJP president Amit Shah is also reported to have had a lengthy meeting with office bearers of the Kadva and Leuva Patidar community organization leaders in a bid to persuade them to pitch in for the ruling party. Hardik Patel and the Patidar Anamat Andolan Samiti (PAAS) which he heads still continues to enjoy considerable clout in the community .
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After Hardik joined the Congress, his team has pitched in headlong into the ensuing Lok Sabha election campaign in favour of the Congress. Hardik has been instrumental in getting Congress nomination for three of the PAAS activists, Geeta Patel in Ahmedabad (east), Lalit Vasoya in Porbandar and Lalit Kagathara in Rajkot.
The members of the PAAS are all set to get into campaigning against the ruling party across all 26 seats of the state. The BJP move to prevent Hardik from contesting the ensuing elections seems to have boomeranged and he has now turned into a star campaigner for the Congress, heli-hopping and holding rallies.
He was slated to contest the polls from Jamnagar but the BJP government opposed his plea for court clearance and the campaigner who would have been tied to a single seat is now a free bird campaigning on all 26 seat.
Meanwhile, the overseas Patidars who are opposed to the BJP have been active and have decided to formulate a strategy to take on the BJP. They are setting up a call centre where from they will coordinate campaigning in Gujarat through person-to person calling amongst friends and relatives.
Shah is particularly in their cross-hairs because they believe that the violence orchestrated on the community on August 25, 2015 was at his behest. The community has been demanding compensation for those killed in police firing, withdrawal of cases against Patidar youth and jobs to their dependents .
According to Dakshesh Patel, a New York campaigner, the Prime Minister had promised that there will be action against those behind the atrocity and it was because of his promise that demonstrations after the one staged in New York were stopped. However, the promises were never kept.
