Jasdan (Guj) Dec 8 (PTI) Koli community leader and sitting BJP MLA Kunvarji Bavaliya defeated his nearest rival from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), Tejas Gajipara, by a margin of 16,172 votes to win from this rural constituency in Saurashtra .
The results came as a surprise as the contest in Jasdan was mostly seen as a fight between six-time MLA Bavaliya and his one-time prodigy Bholabhai Gohil, who was fielded the Congress party. Gohil, also a Koli by caste, finished a close third, winning 45,795 votes, while AAP’s Gajipara won 47,636 votes.
Bavaliya, a former minister, has had a strong grip over Jasdan and used to win this seat for the Congress party until he switched to BJP in 2018. Kolis, a numerically strong OBC community mainly found in Saurashtra and South Gujarat, dominate Jasdan.
Since 1995, Bavaliya has won the seat for the Congress party on four occasions (1995, 1998, 2002 and 2007). He vacated the seat after getting elected as a Lok Sabha MP from Rajkot in 2009. In 2014 Lok Sabha elections, Bavaliya lost from Rajkot and was subsequently fielded by the Congress to contest assembly elections in 2017. He won again from Jasdan, but quit following differences with the party leadership. In 2018, he joined BJP.
There are 2.6 lakh voters in Jasdan, of whom about 1 lakh are Kolis, while Patidars are estimated to be around 60,000. There are also sizeable number Muslim and Dalit voters in Jasdan. PTI PD RM VT VT
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