A meeting of Congress MlAs was held in the State capital Gandhinagar to sign their affirmation to the presidential candidate of UPA Meira Kumar who is commencing the presidential election campaign from historic Sabarmati Ashram in Ahmedabad on Friday.
The meeting was convened by Gujarat Pradesh Congress Committee (GPCC) to express solidarity to the Oppositions’ joint candidate who has been pitted against the BJP led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) candidate Ramnath Kovind. GPCC think tank is worried about possibility of cross-voting given the fact that both the top leaders of the saffron party — PM Modi and BJP’s national president Amit Shah are from Gujarat.
The Opposition party required twenty signatures for the affirmation of Kumar’s nomination, said leader of Opposition in Gujarat Assembly, Shankersinh Vaghela, adding, ‘’however, around 35 MlAs remained present in the meeting. Senior Congress leaders including GPCC president Bharat Solanki will go to Delhi on Wednesday as Maira Kumar is filing her nomination.’’
‘’On Friday all the 57 Congress MlAs and senior Congress leaders in the State will accompany UPA’s presidential nominee at Sabarmati Ashram. She will offer prayer at the Ashram and kick-start her campaign,’’ said GPCC spokesman Manish Doshi.
NDA’s nominee Kovind who is seen as favourite to succeed the current President Pranab Mukherjee initiated his campaign from the biggest State of the country — Uttar Pradesh.
Strategically the Congress party decided to begin its candidate’s poll campaign for the nation’s highest office from the Prime Minister’s home-state Gujarat and that too from Sabarmati Ashram which Gujarat based congress leaders are terming as contest of ideology. Maira Kumar, the daughter of former deputy Prime Minister Jagjivan Ram on Tuesday said that commencing poll campaign from Sabarmati Ashram would give her inner strength.