35 Muslim candidates are eyeing victory at the Lok Sabha polls in Gujarat, as no Muslim representative is fielded by Congress in the state. However, this time, the Congress seems to have strayed away from the conventional way, and none of the aspirants in Gujrat are Muslims.
The Congress has maintained the idea that the seat of the Bharuch Lok Sabha constituency, which had a Muslim candidate contesting the elections from there in the past, is now fielded by the AAP as part of the arranged arrangement of the opposition INDIA bloc constituents.
In an alliance against national parties, only the Bahujan Samaj Party has eligible a Muslim man from Gandhinagar as the candidate of the party voting on the 7th of May. The BSP candidates in the 2019 Laksh Sabha elections comprised one Muslim from Panchmahal.
This time, Muslim candidates are in a total of 35 and in 25 out of 26 Lok Sabha seats in Gujarat, which is opposite from the data from the Election Commission of India in 2019, when 43 candidates were listed from the Muslim community. The fact that the majority of independent candidates are either contesting to win independently or are being fielded by smaller parties potentially diminishes the chances of a party getting a ruby-red victory.
Gujarat Congress’s minority department chairman, Vajirkhan Pathan, conveyed to PTI that the party usually puts up a Muslim candidate and that their focus is primarily on Bharuch, a seat said to be predominantly Muslim. That too could not be done, as the place was given to the AAP for the election. The Congress voted only in one of the Gujarat seats, but the people there did not cooperate, given a little chance of victory, he said. ‘Koran se musalmaan kia kaum ki chunai k kam bhi hua hai. Hamavat ka jismile koi tag ek aur center se nahi hota. In these locations, such as Ahmedabad West and Kutch, with large Muslim populations, tickets are especially set for the Scheduled Caste candidates,” uttered Pathan.
