India

Gujarat Election 2017 : Congress MLAs are locked up at resort near Bengaluru

Gujarat Election 2017 : Congress MLAs are locked up at resort near Bengaluru

The election for the third Rajya Sabha seat in Gujarat is turning out to be a tense battle of nerves with Gujrat Congress hard work to stave off a humiliating defeat which will impact party morale and BJP keen to score a prestigious win that will emphasis its political dominance. Around 44 Gujrat Congress MLA’s from Gujarat have been locked up at a private resort near here after they landed from Ahmadabad on Saturday morning.

All of the Gujarat MLAs have been put up at the Eagleton Golf Resort in Bidadi on the Mysuru road after they flew into the city in two batches from Ahmedabad via Mumbai,” the party’s state unit’s official told IANS on anonymity. The lawmakers were shifted, ostensibly to prevent its rival Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from poaching them ahead of the Rajya Sabha poll in Gujarat on August 8 in which its senior leader Ahmed Patel is contesting for a fifth term.

The resort is located in the Bengaluru Rural Lok Sabha constituency that is represented by the Congress lawmaker D.K. Suresh and younger brother of Karnataka Power Minister D.K. Shivakumar. On Friday party’s high command in Delhi directed officials on Friday night to look after them during their stay in the state. Though they don’t have details on their programme and how long they will stay here. The Congress party decided to shift 44 of its remaining 51 MLAs in the 182-set Gujarat Assembly to the city and prevent them from defecting to the BJP, the ruling party in the western state.

Senior Congress leader Arjun Modhvadia said “What they did in Goa, Manipur and in Bihar, they are trying to do the same in Gujarat. Our legislators are being threatened or offered money. People like an IPS officer who was behind bars for 8-9 years in a fake encounter case are being used to kidnap our MLAs, offer money or threaten our legislators. There are insecurity and environment of terror. So our legislators are being moved to safety,”. On July 26 Patel filed his nomination in Ahmedabad to the political secretary of party President Sonia Gandhi. He needs 47 preference voters in the first round for re-election.

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Pallavi Parmar

Journalism is my profession, Blogging and Writing are my passion, Travelling is my love, Food is my life and Feminist by nature.