Once a holiday home of the Nawab of Junagadh and the ancestral home of the Ambanis, the beach town of Chorwad seems to have decided to back local boy and BJP candidate Rajesh Chudasma who is taking on a more powerful and experienced 5-time Congress MLA Punja Vansh in the Junagadh constituency.
Chorward lies enroute Dwarka and Somnath and has a population of over 35,000. This nondescript, sleepy town is dominated by the Koli community.
“Rajesh is the local boy and a Koli and we all will be voting for him. Moreover, he is also the son of the brother of Hira Chudasma who has been the chairman of the local municipal body for 37 years,” says Bhikhabhai Dabhi who works as an attendant at a guest house in the town where the founder of Reliance Industries Dhirubhai Ambani was born and spent his early years, before making his mark in Indian business history.
Posters and banners of BJP’s prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi and Chudasama dot the town that bears a distinct Ambani patronage. There are Ambani signages on the entrance of the town, educational institutes, the Aden Street, Dhirubhai’s memorial, drinking water system and a hospital. It is 9 am and the local BJP office is bustling with visitors while the Congressmen are yet to open theirs.
“There are just 25 Patel families in Chorwad. We will be all voting for Rajesh,” says Ashwin Patel, a local BJP worker.
The Congress party however does not expect the polls in Chorwad to be an all BJP affair. “Just a year back, the Congress had won the local municipal body election by defeating BJP after 37 long years. Today out of the 21 seats in this body, 12 are with the Congress. So we expect the party to get some important leads from this town,” says a Congress worker Ramesh Chudasma who runs a pan-shop near the Congress office.
“Both Dhirubhai and his family has done a lot of this town. The town has some of the best basic facilities and we believe that once Rajesh goes to the Parliament, the town stands to benefit,” said Nathu Darji.
About 60 kilometers from Chorwad, in Junagadh city, another Koli leader and Congress candidate Punja Vansh is spending Sunday touching base with different sections of the society.
Having travelled over 100 kilometers from his hometown in Una, Punja in his last phase of campaigning is attending a string of public meetings of Kolis, Dalits, Patels, Sindhis and Mochi samaj in Junagadh city.
“Please do not consider this as a fight between two brothers from the same community. This is a fight of principles and hard-work. I have been an MLA for five times from Una since 1990. I have been active in public service for 23 long years and the BJP candidate is yet to prove himself,” says Vansh to Koli-members at Joshipura area of the city.
Both the Congress and the BJP are locked in a head-to-head fight for the Junagadh seat that is home to the Asiatic lions and 14.6 continued…
Native town of Ambani-family in Gujarat bats for BJP
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