The Hindu : Mayawati asks Gujarat voters to defeat BJP, Congress

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Mar 25, 2004

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National

Mayawati asks Gujarat voters to defeat BJP, Congress

By Our Special Correspondent

AHMEDABAD, MARCH 24. The Bahujan Samaj Party leader and the former Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister, Mayawati, launched her party's election campaign in Gujarat today calling upon the voters to defeat both the BJP and the Congress.

Addressing a rally here, Ms. Mayawati said the BSP was going it alone in the State and contesting all the 26 seats. She later released the names of 18 of her candidates and for the lone seat of the Union Territory of Dadra and Nagar Haveli.

Ms. Mayawati said the BSP was not very strong in Gujarat but hoped that the party would still be able to open its account. She said both the BJP and the Congress were "Manuvadi'' parties being concerned only about the upper castes and had always "ill-treated'' the Dalits. The BSP, she said, was not against any caste or religion, and the people from the upper castes and of all religions were welcome in her party if they cared for the national interest.

Meanwhile, the Congress is facing a rebellion within its rank and file in the tribal-dominated district of Dahod over the selection of a candidate for the Lok Sabha seat. The seven-time winner from Dahod, Somji Damor, who only lost the 1999 elections to the BJP, has threatened to resign from the party while his supporters have taken an initiative to dislodge the party from the district panchayat.

Even the district Congress president, Bijalbhai Damor, has joined the chorus against the nomination of Prabhaben Taviar for the seat.

Both he and Somji Damor claimed that the party nominee was an "outsider'' and giving her the ticket would amount to giving the seat "to the BJP on a platter.''

The partymen have turned their wrath against her husband, Kishor Taviar, who is president of the Dahod district panchayat. As many 19 of the 24 Congressmen in the 33-member district panchayat have issued a notice of no-confidence against Dr. Taviar though most of the partymen blamed the Leader of the Opposition, Amarsinh Chaudhary, for the denial of ticket to Somji Damor.

Mr. Damor in a letter to the national president, Sonia Gandhi, said he would prefer to resign from the party before he was blamed for the party's defeat in Dahod which, he said, "was certain if the outsider candidate is not changed.''

Though her husband is the district panchayat president, the supporters of Mr. Damor call the Taviars "outsiders'' just because the doctor couple run a hospital in Godhra, the district headquarters of the Panchamahals.

The DCC president said though he was also a candidate for the seat, he would forego his claim if Somji Damor was given the ticket, but the rank and file in the party were not prepared to accept Dr. Prabhaben as the candidate.

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