Ahmedabad, 23 November 2012

Gujarat Parivartan Party leader Gordhan Zadafia today filed nomination from Gondal seat in Rajkot district.

Though Gujarat BJP has not declared its candidate on Gondal seat, it is believed that former MLA Jayrajsinh Jadeja could be selected for candidature. Jadeja lost Gondal seat by margin of less than 500 votes in last election. He has good hold over not only Kshatriya voters but also some Patidar voters too.

Congress has allotted Gondal seat to Nationalist Congress Party(NCP), and sitting MLA Chandu Vaghasiya is Congress candidate on this seat. Vaghasia is an accused in the Rs 43-lakh land reform scam and he faces charges of fraud, cheating and misappropriation of government fund. He was recently arrested and later released on bail. He is from Patel community, and may cut the votes of Zadafia, or may be Zadafia will cut the votes of Vaghasiya. Jayrajsinh will be benefited in such case.

Gondal Municipality is ruled by BJP. Similarly Taluka Panchayat and Agriculture market are also ruled by BJP. Gondal Nagrik Sahkari bank is ruled by BJP while Taluka kharid vechan sangh is dominated by Congress. Out of four district panchayat seats in Gondal area, 3 are with BJP while 1 with Congress.

Gordhan Zadafia has obviously chosen this seat due to very high number of Congress voters here. As per the new delimitation, there are 70000 Leuva Patel and 14000 Kadva Patel voters in Gondal. They occupy 56% of total votes. There are total 1,45,000 voters and of them 84,000 are Patels. Keshubhai Patel won this seat in 1980.