Bhopal: The Bharatiya Janata Party candidate from Bhopal, Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur is unlikely to have a smooth ride to the Lok Sabha in her battle against Congress candidate, former Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Digvijaya Singh. For both parties, the Bhopal seat has become a prestige issue and, therefore, none of them are leaving any stones unturned to win it.
The seat has remained with the BJP for 30 continuous years. But the situation is different this time because of Congress opting to field a veteran leader like Digvijaya Singh from here. After the Congress announced Singh’s name for the seat, BJP took many days to declare its candidate. Sources said, initially former CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan was asked to contest from Bhopal, but he refused. Efforts were made to persuade Uma Bharti as well, however she too refused. Since senior leaders were reluctant to fight from the seat, the BJP took the risk of fielding Pragya Thakur from here.
A visit to Bhopal showed that the required enthusiasm among the BJP workers was missing, compared to their Congress counterparts. However, RSS workers were putting in their best to ensure Pragya Thakur’s victory. Sources said Pragya Thakur’s problem was that she lacked the connect with the voters, while Digvijaya, having been in public life for many decades, knew a vast number of people in the city apparently “by name”. However, BJP sources said that the situation may improve for the party after senior leaders such as Amit Shah and Nitin Gadkari visit Bhopal to address election rallies in support of Pragya Thakur. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s programme in Bhopal has not been finalised so far.
Speaking to this newspaper, Bhupendra Gupta, senior MP Congress leader, said that in the 2014 elections, people got “misguided” by the “false promises” of BJP. “Whatever development Bhopal witnessed, it was under the Congress government. The BJP MPs did nothing for the constituency. BJP denied ticket to its sitting MP Alok Sanjar. The Kamal Nath government, soon after coming to power in the state, took several measures for farmers and the poor, which have started showing results on the ground,” he said.
Gupta alleged that “RSS is trying to polarise the elections here but the essence of Bhopalis is in Ganga-Jamuni tehzeeb and, therefore, Digvijaya Singh will win the seat comfortably.”
The BJP, however, rubbishes these allegations. “There is no question of polarisation. We are seeking votes on the basis of development measures taken by the Narendra Modi government in the last five years. Three factors are working in our favour—the Modi factor, sympathy for Pragya Thakur for all that she suffered in custody and then the Mr Bantadhar factor. (Bantadhar is one who messes up things, a term used for Digvijaya Singh by his opponents.) Under Digvijaya Singh as Chief Minister, the situation in Madhya Pradesh had become very bad and that’s what we are reminding the people here,” senior state BJP leader Sarvesh Tiwari said.
As regards voters, there is a sense of disapproval of the controversial statements made by Pragya Thakur. “She should not have commented against Hemant Karkare. A person may have several weaknesses, but there is no point talking about them after their death. She is yet to learn what being a politician means. If people vote for her, they will do so only because of Modi,” said Arjun Ram, a paan seller at Bhopal’s MP Nagar.