Polling for 3 Rajya Sabha seats in Gujarat today

Of the six MLAs who resigned from the Assembly, three instantly joined the ruling BJP and one of them – Balwantsinh Rajput – became saffron party’s candidate for the RS polls along with BJP president Amit Shah and Union Minister Smriti Irani. The BJP, on the other hand, has stated that there was nothing personal, and if the Congress MLAs were deserting their party, it was because of their disillusionment with their leadership. Ahmed Patel’s election to the Rajya Sabha is of utmost importance to the Congress that has lost its “largest party” tag to the BJP by one seat recently.

Patel needs 45 votes to win. Thus reducing the Congress tally to 51 in the 182 seat Gujarat Assembly. So, Bapu’s group would play key role in today’s polls.Late night on Monday, in an address to the media, Vaghela only had this much to say: I cautioned the Congress about the Congress MLAs’ possibility to join the BJP. The MLAs have remained committed to the party in the last few days while in Bengaluru.

The senior leader of Gujarat Congress, Vaghela had allegedly quit after the party decided of not projecting him as a chief ministerial candidate. Ahmedabad police commissioner AK Singh, Ahmedabad Crime branch Joint CP JK Bhatt, Ahmedabad Rang IGP RB Bhrambhatt, DG intelligence Shivanand Jha, with more than 95 security persons will escort the Congress MLAs. However, out of these 50, six MLAs are not being trusted fully by the party as they are supposed be camp followers of Vaghela.

On Monday, as the Congress shifted its 44 MLAs from a resort in Bengaluru to one in Anand district, Gujarat, the seven party legislators who had refused to be shuttled around, continued to give the party leadership a harrowing time.

The Gujarat Congress had sent more than 40 of its legislators to Bengaluru on July 29 to fend off what it called “poaching” attempts by the BJP.

However, Ahmed Patel is sure that he has enough support to win the upcoming elections with a major fraction belonging to the JD (U) and NCP. Patel is also the political secretary to Congress president Sonia Gandhi. However, the party will have to depend on cross-voting by Congress MLAs for the third seat.

The Congress has the strength of 51 in the House but it can not bank upon the seven MLAs who refused to go to Bengaluru. The party said the MLAs were attending “classes” on the history of the Congress and the “lies of the BJP”. Senior NCP leader Praful Patel earlier on Sunday said his party wasn’t clear about choosing a path.

Speaking to ANI here, the BJP leader Sudesh Verma said, “BJP is confident of victory on all seats for the simple fact that BJP has numbers and we have already seen that Congress is divided house”. “BJP usually follows the policy of not repeating almost 40% of its MLAs in next elections”. The results will be in our favour. “All 3 candidates of BJP will win tomorrow”, he said.