BJP mulls Gujarat 2022 poll strategy

Party meets for brainstorming session to prepare blueprint for poll

Party senior leaders believe that if the AAP’s influence spreads in rural areas, it will not damage BJP, but if its influence increases in urban areas, it will be problematic for the ruling party.

As Gujarat heads for Assembly elections later this year, and the Congress is busy preparing plans at the ‘Chintan Shivir’ in Udaipur and the Aam Aadmi Party has launched Parivartan Yatra in the state, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party kicked off its state-level ‘Chintan Baithak’ on the outskirts of Ahmedabad yesterday.

The two-day brainstorming session, which started at a club in Bagodara, is chaired by Union Home and Cooperative Minister Amit Shah, while prominent participants include national General Secretary, Organisation, B.L. Santosh, Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel, state unit president C.R. Patil, and other senior leaders, like former deputy chief minister Nitin Patel.

Major issues

Party sources said major issues to be discussed include the BJP’s prospects on all the 182 seats and how to counter issues like inflation, unemployment, and the image of the state government, which is badly damaged by paper leaks in competitive exams one after another.

Though the BJP is publicly underplaying the Aam Aadmi Party’s presence in the state, it takes it seriously in private, sources said, adding that the

AAP’s spread and rising influence in the state is concern and it will be discussed in detail, to ascertain where Arvind Kejriwal’s party can sabotage its prospects.

According to sources, party senior leaders believe that if the AAP’s influence spreads in rural areas, it will not damage BJP, but if its influence increases in urban areas, it will be problematic for the ruling party and so the BJP is going to prepare a counter-strategy to check AAP’s influence in urban areas.

To weaken the Congress further, the BJP is still going to lure a few more of its MLAs and leaders, and Hardik Patel is on the top of the list, said sources. If the last one works out, BJP leaders believe half the match is already won.

The BJP has identified more than 40 seats, which it won in 2017 with a paper thin margin, and some seats which Congress never lost post2002 riots.