Ahmedabad, Oct 24 (PTI) A candidate of the opposition INDIA bloc will contest against the BJP nominee in the bypoll to the Vav assembly seat in Gujarat’s Banaskantha district, where voting will take place on November 13.
The Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) are constituents of INDIA, a grouping of more than two dozen parties formed at the national level ahead of the general elections earlier this year.
“Since both parties are part of the INDIA bloc, we have reached a consensus that a Congress candidate will contest the bypoll to Vav seat and AAP will not nominate anyone,” said Gujarat Congress spokesperson, Manish Doshi.
He said the Congress high command is expected to announce a name by Thursday night or Friday morning from a panel of three potential candidates shared by the state leadership after carrying out “sense” exercise (to assess winnability).
As per the notification issued by the Election Commission (EC), candidates can file their nomination papers till 3 pm on Friday.
Gujarat AAP spokesperson Karan Barot also confirmed that his party won’t field its candidate for the bye election to the Vav seat as part of their agreement with Congress.
Ruling BJP’s national parliamentary board is also expected to declare their candidate by Thursday night, said a party leader from Gujarat.
The EC had on October 15 announced that the bypoll would be held on November 13 and votes would be counted on November 23.
The Vav seat fell vacant following the resignation of Congress MLA Geniben Thakor in June after her election to the Lok Sabha from Banaskantha.
Vav has been a Congress stronghold, with Thakor winning from there in 2017 and 2022.
In this year’s Lok Sabha polls, Thakor, a two-time MLA, defeated BJP’s Rekhaben Chaudhary, who was fighting her first election, from Banaskantha by over 30,000 votes.
She was the only Congress candidate to register a win in Gujarat in the general elections.
Congress’ strength in the 182-seat assembly is 12, while the ruling BJP has 161 MLAs. The House also has 4 AAP legislators, one from the Samajwadi Party and two Independents. PTI PJT PD NR
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