The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has not heeded to the demand of the Kshatriya community to change Union Fisheries Minister Parshottam Rupala as the candidate from Gujarat’s Rajkot Lok Sabha seat following his utterances against the community.

Now, the Kshatriya community has announced that it will boycott the BJP in the forthcoming elections in Gujarat. The Kshatriyas have coined a slogan – “Vote Is The Weapon”.

For nearly a month now, the Kshatriyas have stuck to their demand and the announcement to boycott the BJP was made after the last day of filing the nominations on April 19.

Gujarat goes to vote on 26 seats on May 7. The BJP had won all the seats in the 2014 and 2019 elections.

After a meeting that lasted for nearly three hours in Ahmedabad, Karansinh Chavda, spokesperson of the coordination committee of the Kshatriyas, announced that the community will “oppose/boycott the BJP and persuade people from other communities as well to vote against the BJP”.

Beginning April 22, yatras will be taken out from the temples of Goddesses’ located in five different parts of the state. The spokesperson claimed that they would organise the network till the booth level and ensure that the people voted against the BJP.

Programmes of the BJP will be opposed with black flags. Chavda said they have been protesting peacefully and the fight is to be long.

Women will observe symbolic one-day fasts. Women’s wing president of the coordination committee Truptiba Raol said they had a hope that the BJP would understand them. “It is a question of our pride,” she said, adding that in the past the royals had given their states when Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel had asked during the unification of the country.”

On March 22, at a function organised by the Valmiki community – Dalits – Rupala had said, “Erstwhile princely states maintained relations with the British. Sons and daughters of the royals married the British, but the Rukhi Samaj, which was the most oppressed, had nothing to do with the colonial rulers”. The Valmiki community is also referred to as the Rukhi Samaj.

Rupala, a school principal turned politician, followed this up with an apology on March 24 as the Kshatriyas were hurt by the statement. He apologised twice but the Kshatriyas remained firm on their demand. Neither did the BJP blink nor did the Kshatriyas.

On April 16, at a public meeting before filing his nomination papers, Rupala, a Kadva Patel, had exhorted the Kshatriyas to “have a large heart and support the BJP”.

During a roadshow in his Gandhinagar constituency on April 18, Union Home Minister Amit Shah said that Rupala has apologised and there are no complaints against him now. “There is no resentment now,” he said.

Ahmedabad-based sociologist Gaurang Jani observed that nobody is writing that thousands of Kshatriya ladies, with saree pallu on head, have come out to protest. He also said that this is something new developing on a caste basis.

“In the last fortnight, we have had a series of meetings with the BJP leadership in Gujarat and our demand has been that either Rupalaji withdraws, voluntarily, or is asked to withdraw his candidature,” P. T. Jadeja, a Kshatriya community leader, told The Citizen.

“In the last meeting we were told that the decision is taken by the Central Parliamentary Board, and it would be apprised of our views,” he added.

To say that Kshatriya ire will be instrumental in the BJP losing seats is perhaps still farfetched, but now that they have decided to oppose the BJP it will surely impact the victory margins.

Gujarat BJP president C. R. Paatil has given a target of winning each seat by a margin of over five lakh votes. The BJP has been in power in Gujarat for nearly three decades.

Jadeja claimed that the Kshatriyas opposition can have an impact on eight Lok Sabha seats, including Jamnagar, Rajkot, Surendranagar, Banaskantha and Anand.

What’s behind the anger? The Kshatriyas say they felt neglected under the BJP rule. “Kshatriyas joined the Swatantra Party in late 1950s, but they did not get so many seats that they could form a government,” said Jani.

Gujarat state was formed on May 1, 1960, and thereafter the Kshatriyas got good support in the chief minister of 1980s Madhavsinh Solanki, who propounded the KHAM (Kshatriyas, Harijans, Adivasis, Muslims) theory in mid-1980s and excluded the Patels from it.

However, under the BJP rule they say they have felt neglected. Aware of this fact, the BJP in the mid-1990s tried to do a balancing act by making Keshubhai Patel as the chief minister and Shankersinh Vaghela as the state party president. Patels got more positions in the government.

Keshubhai Patel and the then Vishwa Hindu Parishad functionary Dr. Pravin Togadiya were among those who played a major role.

The Kshatriyas had joined the police force in large numbers and their opportunity got limited once the reservation came in, Jani said, adding that the community felt they “suffered” on this count as well.

In 2016, Hardik Patel, a young leader, emerged from nowhere and led an agitation for reservation for Patel youth. The Centre’s move of giving reservation to the economically backward is considered a feather in Hardik Patel’s cap. Anandi Patel, the then Chief Minister, was changed reportedly for her alleged failure to handle the stir.

The Congress got 77 out of the 182 Assembly seats in 2017 elections, its best performance, thanks to the Patidar stir. Post elections, Patel first joined the Congress and after a brief stint there, he joined the BJP.

“A win-win situation for the Kshatriyas,” Jani said adding, “it is not a small thing that thousands of Kshatriya women have come out to protest.

“The Kshatriyas have felt neglected, and it reflected in their meeting near Rajkot on April 14 when nearly five lakh people gathered. Even till today, some or another meeting of the BJP is disturbed by the Kshatriyas.”

However, Jani also observed that if the fight has to continue beyond the elections then the Kshatriyas will have to talk about much more than the ‘pride’ issue.

The BJP may put up a brave face, but the way the announcement of boycott has been made, it is clear that the agitation has not only put the party leaders in an embarrassing situation, but also on tenterhooks. It threatens to disturb the mathematics of the party in its safest state, the home turf of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Shah.

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