Ahmedabad: With just two days left before Gujarat votes in the first of two-phase elections, posters asking the state’s Muslim population to vote for the Congress to ensure its senior leader Ahmed Patel becomes the chief minister have appeared all over Surat.
Patel, a close aide of Sonia Gandhi and Rajya Sabha MP from the state, said the party had nothing to do with the posters and called it a mischievous bid by the BJP to polarize the election.
The posters feature a smiling photo of Patel with Rahul Gandhi and Congress poll symbol, the ‘hand’. Below the pictures, written in Gujarati is an appeal to the Muslim community.
“To maintain unity within the Muslim community and to make Ahmed Patel the 'wazir-e-alam' (grand minister) of Gujarat, we request the Muslim community to vote only for the Congress," the poster reads.
Blaming the BJP, Patel quickly rebutted the contents of the banner and said he was not a contender for the chief minister's post and would never be.
“The moot issue is that the BJP is trying very, very hard to divert the narrative from its performance of last 22 years to a divisive agenda. Hence, their reliance on lies and propaganda. But people of Gujarat have made up their mind this time,” Patel tweeted.
"Putting up fake posters and orchestrating a rumour campaign shows the utter desperation of the BJP. Fearing defeat, do they have to rely on such dirty tricks? I have never ever been a candidate for the CM and will never, ever be,” he added.
Putting up fake posters and orchestrating a rumour campaign shows the utter desperation of the BJP. Fearing defeat, do they have to rely on such dirty tricks? I have never ever been a candidate for CM and will never, ever be— Ahmed Patel (@ahmedpatel) December 7, 2017
He said the "misinformation campaign by the BJP" showed that they know they were going to lose Gujarat elections.
BJP, too, denied that it had anything to do with the posters. Party spokesperson Bharat Pandya said it has become a habit for Congress to level baseless allegations. “First they create posters and make them viral and then blame us. They blamed us even for the fake candidates list that went viral," he said.
The BJP also disowned another set of posters that have cropped up in the state. These feature chief minister Vijay Rupani, BJP president Amit Shah and PM Narendra Modi. Below the photos of the three, their initials are taken to spell out ‘RAM’.
The poster also has photos of the three young caste leaders in Gujarat who are supporting the Congress - Hardik Patel, Alpesh Thakore and Jignesh Mevani. Their initials below their pictures spell ‘HAJ,’ the Muslim pilgrimage.
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