ON Saturday night, the Aam Aadmi Celebration (AAP) that has been noticeably silent on Muslim points in its Gujarat marketing campaign, notably associated to the 2002 riots, took out a Tiranga Yatra by means of the predominantly Muslim areas of Ahmedabad. The primary such yatra by AAP by means of these constituencies was led by the occasion’s star campaigner and Punjab Chief Minister, Bhagwant Mann.
AAP could be seen as a risk primarily to the Congress within the state, however right here in seats presently represented by Congress MLAs, the day after AAP’s yatra, most individuals say they don’t seem to be going to alter their political loyalty.
Sarfaraz Seth owns Bismillah Resort in Shah-e-Alam space, positioned simply three retailers away from the AAP native workplace. A banner on the entrance shows the occasion’s image broom, and photographs of AAP supremo and Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, Mann, occasion’s state president Gopal Italia, and its CM face Isudan Gadhvi.
The areas that AAP coated throughout its Saturday yatra are lined with comparable eating places as Seth’s, other than smaller eateries, car service centres, cycle restore retailers, and Shah-e-Alam Roza, a Fifteenth-Century shrine.
Seth, 34, says the Congress will win once more from the Dani Limda seat, which fell within the AAP yatra route. A Scheduled Caste reserved constituency, it’s presently represented by Shailesh Parmar of the Congress. “The Aam Aadmi Celebration is a brand new occasion, and has by no means labored wherever in Gujarat. We have no idea the way it works. He (Arvind Kejriwal) retains repeating his ensures of free electrical energy, good schooling, medical therapy, employment and so forth, however it’s Staff B of the BJP,” Seth says, repeating a terror that many have and the Congress has been stressing upon.
Seth, who was born and introduced up within the space and has been working the lodge for not less than a decade, additionally says that they’re proud of the Congress MLA. “They even obtained this highway repaired a number of months again… MLA Parmar is approachable and we’re acquainted with the Congress workplace right here. Corporator (ward Dani Limda of the Ahmedabad Municipal Company) Shehzad Khan Pathan (of the Congress) can be accessible, and solves our issues… We vote for the Congress due to them.”
In distinction, voters level out, the AAP workplace within the space opened simply three-four days again. “Inka kya bharosa… aaj hain, kal nahi hain (They’ll’t be trusted, they’re right here at the moment, could also be gone tomorrow).”
Kesar Khan, 45, who owns a battery retailer throughout the Shah-e-Alam shrine, says they’ve little doubt that the BJP will return to energy within the state. “Individuals can vote for whoever they need, however it’s the BJP which can anyhow kind the federal government. So, we are going to guarantee that the Congress wins from our constituency… It’s going to at all times be the BJP within the state and the Congress in Dani Limda.”
The AIMIM, which gained seven seats within the Ahmedabad Municipal Company in its debut election in February 2021, didn’t win any of the 4 wards of Dani Limda, although it scored wins within the neighbouring Jamalpur.
The voters say AAP can be at an obstacle because the candidate it has fielded from Dani Limda – retired mamlatdar Dinesh Kapadia – is an “outsider”. Kapadia’s identify was introduced early in September, and his photograph options in AAP posters now.
On the AAP workplace, caretaker Hanif Noor Pawan, 60, says that whereas the Shah-e-Alam workplace opened solely now, “the primary workplace for the constituency was inaugurated two months again”.
In direction of the Shah-e-Alam Darwaza stands Khala Medical Shops of Anwar Khan, 41. He didn’t be part of the AAP march, Khan says, and can vote for the Congress once more, “like at all times”. “Anybody can maintain a rally… AAP is a brand new occasion, it should be performing nicely in Delhi and Punjab, however their guarantees don’t sync with our mentality. Perhaps it matches nicely with the mindset of these states. Right here, all these ensures won’t work,” says Khan, repeating that they vote for the Congress due to corporator Pathan.
Khan additionally says that they’re decided to make sure that their vote doesn’t get divided. “Within the 2007 Meeting elections, the NCP had additionally contested and the battle had grow to be the Congress versus NCP. The votes obtained divided, and the BJP gained. We don’t wish to take the danger, for a celebration which has by no means labored in Gujarat.”
The Shah-e-Alam space additionally has a 50-year-old settlement of Bangladeshi immigrants known as Chandola Talav Basti, or Bangladeshi Basti. Minarul Sheikh, 35, whose father got here from Bangladesh and who was born right here, says, “None of us went for the rally by Mann. There isn’t a level. It’s simply Shehzad Khan Pathan who listens to us. So we vote for the Congress.”
Sheikh provides: “In all these years, not a single occasion has come to our basti, to woo us with their guarantees, or enquire about our calls for. So, why ought to we go to any such rallies, when they don’t even hassle?”
All of the residents right here have voter identification playing cards. Sheikh says that, in opposition to their higher judgment, they as soon as went for a rally (protest) in opposition to the NRC and Citizenship (Modification) Act, earlier than the pandemic. “However individuals had been overwhelmed up. They didn’t have any proof in opposition to us… however they merely picked up a number of individuals… So we keep away from going for any form of rally,” he says.
Ramesh Vohra, a part of AAP candidate Kapadia’s crew, says that the occasion will proceed to deal with its problems with growth. “We are going to follow our manifesto, of reopening closed colleges, bettering the varsity infrastructure within the space, offering free electrical energy and so on. The Congress has been profitable, but it surely has not fulfilled something in its manifesto, besides an Ambedkar Corridor. There’s a extreme downside of water, drainage, and roads in lots of chawls of Dani Limda.”
Vohra provides that they’d recognized two main communities within the space – “Dalits and minorities (Muslims)”. “We are going to work first for them.”
Nonetheless, why has the occasion not engaged with the Muslim neighborhood on delicate points such because the latest Kheda flogging or the discharge of the Bilkis Bano case convicts? Vohra defends: “There isn’t a level in stepping into controversial points when there are issues of growth, comparable to electrical energy, water and schooling, throughout communities. So, we are going to be certain that first that every one these are supplied to the individuals. Our job is to actualise what’s written on paper (of the Structure) and make it attain the bottom.”