State leaders of Gujarat Congress and a section of disgruntled Gujarat BJP leaders supported Patel quota leader Hardik Patel with the objective to destabilise the Gujarat government and spread unrest, sources in the state police have said. They say that Hardik also got financial support from a section of the state’s industrial lobby at the behest of the Congress and some disgruntled state BJP leaders, whose main aim is to target Prime Minister Narendra Modi by attacking Chief Minister Anandi Ben’s government and spread disturbance in Gujarat, the PM’s home turf.
“Electronic surveillance has revealed that Hardik Patel got financial support from an influential group of diamond merchants based in Surat. The agitation was also financed by a section of the Ahmedabad based builders’ lobby who were acting at the behest of some Congress and BJP leaders including a former minister. Eight BJP leaders from the state were in constant touch with him, guiding him throughout the entire period of the agitation,” said a senior Gandhinagar based police officer. The officer refused to share the name of the leaders who have been supporting Hardik Patel.
When Hardik came to Delhi, some businessmen allegedly gave him around Rs 90 lakh at the behest of the disgruntled BJP leaders, who, according to police officers, were working in close coordination with Congress leaders from the state.
In the second week of September, Hardik also sought support from former Gujarat Chief Minister Keshubhai Patel, whom he met. Keshubhai Patel is known to be opposed to the Prime Minister. Hardik’s photographs with a senior VHP leader, who is a known baiter of Narendra Modi, had gone viral on social media during the agitation, when Hardik’s supporters retorted to large scale violence in Gujarat.
“The Patel agitation showed how easy it is to manufacture unrest in the country if one has adequate resources. The same ‘model’ can be applied by anti-national forces on a larger scale to destabilise the country. Hence, we will share the ‘modus-operandi’ used in Gujarat with the Central agencies so that a similar situation is not repeated anywhere else in the future,” the official said.
Hardik is in police custody after being arrested on charges of sedition. Officials investigating the case say that that the electronic evidence collected by them will be presented before the court in order to prove that there was a bigger conspiracy behind the whole agitation.