Gujarat Assembly polls first list: AAP names 11 candidates

“Congress appears to be more scared of AAP than BJP as some of its leaders say that AAP is here to help the BJP,” Rai said.

AAP declared its first list of candidates for 11 Assembly constituencies in Gujarat including Rajkot (West), while stating that it would not contest from the seats where it is weak. Rajkot (West) is currently represented by Chief Minister Vijay Rupani. AAP will field businessman Rajesh Bhut from the seat. Bhut says he was badly hit by the GST. Delhi minister and AAP’s Gujarat election in-charge Gopal Rai told reporters here that the names were finalised at a meeting of the party’s political affairs committee in Delhi on Friday.

The constituency-wise candidates announced by AAP are: Anil Verma (Bapunagar), Ramesh Patel (Unjha), Rajesh Bhut (Rajkot West), J J Mewada (Danilimda), Nimeesha Khunt (Gondal), M D Manajaria (Lathi), Arjun Rathwa (Chhota Udepur), Rajendra Patel (Padra), Hanif Jamadar (Karjan), Rajiv Pandey (Pardi) and Ram Dhaduk (Kamrej). Of these, nine constituencies are currently represented by BJP MLAs, while Danilimda in Ahmedabad and Chhota Udepur are with the Congress.

“We will fight these elections with a pledge to rid Gujarat of BJP. We had earlier said we will fight against the BJP on select seats. We want to give a direct fight to the ruling party, and will not contest from any seat where we are weak and where there is possibility of division of votes which may help the BJP,” Rai said.

“Congress appears to be more scared of AAP than BJP as some of its leaders say that AAP is here to help the BJP. To form the government in Gujarat, a party needs to win 92 seats. AAP has fielded candidates on 11 seats. We have not touched other 171 seats yet. If Congress give us guarantee and publicly pledges that it will defeat the BJP on all these remaining seats, we will limit ourselves to 11 seats,” he said.