AHMEDABAD: The BJP is keen to advance Assembly elections in Gujarat. Parleys to advance the election has been initiated at the top level in the BJP and the RSS. As per schedule, elections are supposed to be held in December 2017 but the BJP is contemplating to prepone it by at least six months. A top BJP leader told Mirror that early elections clearly benefit the BJP.
A section of the BJP also feels that ‘there should be a total revamp and even the chief ministerial candidate of BJP should be changed”. This is under discussion. While one section feels that Chief Minister Vijay Rupani is not even six months old and imposing another chief ministerial candidate may not augur well for the party, some other senior leaders strongly believe that Rupani lacks the appeal to lead the party in the crucial 2017 polls.
They feel that the best way to counter Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Congress is by throwing up a leader belonging to Other Backward Class (OBC) as the party’s chief ministerial candidate. Nearly 45% of the state’s population falls under various OBC categories. This includes 32.5% percentage in rural areas. An OBC chief ministerial candidate could hugely upset the Congress and AAP calculations.
