For BJP’s No.2, Gandhinagar is constituency No.1

For the BJP’s tallest leaders, the Gandhinagar Lok Sabha seat has been a secure throne since 1989. Atal Bihari Vajpayee won the seat in 1996; L K Advani has retained it since 1998; and now the Gandhinagar run of the party’s president, Amit Shah, has confirmed his stature as the BJP’s Number 2 notable.
Shah’s candidature segues into the BJP’s narrative of its respect for meritocracy.His political career began in 1982 when he was made the head of the polling booth at Sanghvi High School in Naranpura, an assembly segment within the Gandhinagar Lok Sabha constituency.

On April 3 this year, Shah arrived in Ahmedabad to file his nomination form. Amid the fanfare, he recalled his humble beginnings. "I pasted posters and painted walls when I was in charge of a booth," he told his supporters. "Now I have been appointed the national president of the BJP. My journey shows that anybody can rise in this party." The acknowledgement of Shah’s rise was evidenced by political heavyweights who had turned up in Gujarat to be by his side.
They included Union finance minister Arun Jaitley; Union minister of road transport and highways Nitin Gadkari; and railways minister Piyush Goyal. The NDA partners present included Shiv Sena supremo Uddhav Thackeray; Shiromani Akali Dal’s Parkash Singh Badal; and Lok Janshakti Party president Ram Vilas Paswan. During the Shah show, Thackeray announced that he had "ended his differences" with the BJP.
Since the Gandhinagar seat has been a BJP borough since the party first fought for all 26 Lok Sabha seats in Gujarat in 1989, the party’s workers are aspiring to a massive win to herald Shah’s debut in the lower house. His Congress rival in the battle is C J Chavda, the sitting Gandhinagar (North) MLA. For the record, this seat delivered the highest margin of victory for a BJP MP in India when Advani won by 4.83 lakh votes in 2014. Even the lowest margin with which Advani won is substantial: 1.21 lakh votes (in 2009).
Many in BJP circles say that party cadre had been earnestly demanding for years that a leader of Shah’s stature contest for Gandhinagar. Perhaps that is why months before Shah filed his nomination, the Ahmedabad Urban Development Authority announced infrastructure projects worth Rs 534 crore for areas within the constituency. The projects were meant to solve water, gutter, and traffic problems in Bopal, Godhavi, Ghuma, and Shela. The creation of affordable housing was another aim of the projects.
The Gandhinagar Lok Sabha seat became 82% urban and 18% rural after delimitation in 2008. It was more balanced earlier. Rural pockets of Dahegam and Gandhinagar South were struck out from the constituency. Kalol and Sanand assembly segments were added to it. Two of the main assembly segments under this Lok Sabha seat — Naranpura and Ghatlodia — are BJP fiefs that have provided crushing victories. Anandiben Patel, a former chief minister, won Ghatlodia by 1.10 lakh votes in the 2012 assembly election. In the same election, Shah won Naranpura by 63,335 votes.
"After delimitation, the Gandhinagar Lok Sabha constituency sewed together BJP voters and is designed to elect leader with massive margins," said a senior BJP figure. Gandhinagar city has a sizable population of government employees. Scheduled Caste population accounts for 11-13% of voters; Patels comprise 13%; and Thakor voters are estimated to be around 11%. The assembly segment of Vejalpur, which comes under this Lok Sabha constituency, has 40 % Muslim population. Juhapura, the largest Muslim ghetto of Gujarat, is part of Vejalpur and is home to more than 3 lakh Muslims.
The largest voting populations in this Lok Sabha constituency lie in the assembly segments of Vejalpur (3 lakh) and Ghatlodia (3.52 lakh). Shah is striving to woo members of Thakor and Rabari communities of these two areas. Shah has chosen members from these communities to be his proposers for his nomination form. "Shah has been contacting Bhuajis (spiritual leaders) of the Rabari community to seek their support," a senior BJP functionary said.
"Even if PM Modi campaigns here, Shah will lose this election," said the Congress candidate Chavda, a veterinary doctor and former bureaucrat. "The Congress will perform well in Gandhinagar, Kalol, Sanand and Vejalpur assembly segments. If the BJP is so sure of winning this seat, why is Shah appealing to housing societies for votes? Why is he holding so many roadshows?"