Gujarat Assembly Election 2022: Not a single ticket for about 10 percent of the population, BJP has not made a single Muslim candidate in 24 years
Gujarat Election: The Muslim population in Kutch district of Gujarat is 21%. In the last elections, the BJP had won four out of six assembly seats in Kutch. The remaining two went to the Congress.
The BJP has announced the names of all its candidates for the Gujarat Assembly Elections 2022. The BJP had announced the names of 160 candidates in the first list. The BJP leader had then told that out of 160, his party has fielded 13 Scheduled Caste (SC) and 24 Scheduled Tribe (ST) leaders. 14 women candidates also got a place in the first list.
However, there was no name of any Muslim candidate in the list. The BJP released a total of five lists for the two-phase Gujarat Assembly elections, but none of the lists had the name of a single Muslim candidate.
About 10 percent of the state’s population is Muslim
According to the available data of Census 2011, the total population of Gujarat is about 6 crores. Hindus constitute 88.57 percent and Muslims about 9.67 percent of the total population. That is, about 58.47 lakh Muslims live in the state, but their participation in the power of the state is almost negligible. In the last assembly elections (2017), only four Muslim candidates were elected. All four contested the election on Congress ticket. In the year 1980, when Madhav Singh Solanki from Congress became the Chief Minister, then 12 Muslim leaders reached the assembly.
Gujarat, BJP and Muslims
The BJP has been in power in Gujarat for nearly 27 years. Since the formation of the BJP in the year 1980, so far nine assembly elections have been held in Gujarat. Meanwhile, the BJP has given ticket to a Muslim leader in just one election. For the first and last time in the Gujarat assembly elections, the BJP had fielded a Muslim 24 years ago on the Vagra assembly seat in Bharuch district. The BJP had lost that seat. Since then till date BJP has not given ticket to a single Muslim leader in any election.
Let us tell you that in Gujarat, which has 182 assembly seats, voting will be held in two phases on December 1 and December 5. Voting is to be held on 89 seats in the first phase and 93 seats in the second phase. The counting of votes will take place on December 8.
