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counting of votes will be taken up on December 8.

If Gujarat is riot-free today then it’s because of BJP and PM Modi. The more Gujarat progresses, the more India will progress. If Gujarat wins, then India will progress: Union Minister Anurag Thakur addresses a public meeting in Mangrol

The chief ministers of three states, six Union ministers and six other national leaders will cover 46 Assembly seats while state leaders will campaign in 36 seats on a single day, said state BJP chief C R Paatil.

It will launch the party’s campaigning for the candidates in the first phase, he said.

As per the party tradition, the BJP will launch “carpet bombing” programmes of public meetings across 82 of 89 seats, Paatil said. BJP president J P Nadda, Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath and Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma will be in Gujarat on Friday.

Union ministers who will take part in campaigning are Nitin Gadkari, Narendra Singh Tomar, Anurag Thakur, Faggan Singh Kulaste, V K Singh and Bharati Pawar. Maharashtra Deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis, UP deputy CM Brijesh Pathak, Leader of Opposition in West Bengal Suvendu Adhikari, BJP Yuva Morcha national president Tejasvi Surya and MP Jamyang Tsering Namgyal are also in the list of national leaders who will hit the campaign trail of Friday.

Apart from national leaders, Gujarat Chief Minister (Bhupendra Patel), former CM (Vijay Rupani), former deputy chief ministers, ex-MLAs who are not contesting, former ministers and Members of Parliament from Gujarat will also participate in the programme.

Furthermore, six BJP leaders including a sitting MLA and four former legislators have filed nominations as independents after being denied tickets by the saffron party for the next month’s polls. For 89 seats which would go to the polls in the first phase, Thursday was the last day for the withdrawal of nominations.

The BJP won assembly polls in Gujarat six consecutive times since 1995 and is pulling out all the stops to keep its winning streak uninterrupted in the traditionally bipolar poll involving the Congress, spiced up this time by the entry of the AAP.

Meanwhile, Congress continues its attack on the ruling BJP over the collapse of the suspension bridge in Morbi recently. Senior Congress leader Digvijaya Singh on Thursday targeted Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel over the Morbi bridge collapse and claimed it was an “act of fraud of the highest degree”.

Addressing a press conference in poll-bound Gujarat, Rajya Sabha member Singh said there cannot be a bigger administrative failure than the bridge collapse tragedy last month which claimed 135 lives, and said CM Patel should have resigned over the incident. The suspension bridge located on the Machchhu river in Morbi collapsed on October 30, four days after it was reopened following its repair and renovation.

Singh said, “(Prime Minister) Narendra Modi had termed a bridge collapse in West Bengal as an ‘act of fraud’ in response to the ‘act of God’ comment of a Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader. Modiji, was Morbi an act of God or an act of fraud?” “It was a fraud of the highest degree and Modiji, you are responsible and accountable,” the former Madhya Pradesh chief minister claimed.

Singh said Gujarat Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel should have resigned over the tragedy.

MCD elections 2022

The Aam Aadmi Party kicked off its first phase of campaigning on Thursday, with its candidates starting marches in the 250 wards of Delhi and a cabinet minister carrying out a cleanliness drive The party offices in all the 250 wards of the MCD elections were also inaugurated. “All the candidates will work in tandem with their respective ward offices,” it said in a statement.

The first phase of campaigning will start on November 17 and go on till November 22. The second phase will start on November 23.

AAP had started a ‘Jan Samvad’ (public dialogue) campaign at the booth level a few days ago. Its star campaigners and all the 250 candidates are holding a public dialogue at each booth every day against the alleged garbage mismanagement.

Meanwhile, aiming to return to power in the MCD for the fourth time in a row, Delhi BJP has drawn up a list of over 60 star campaigners, including party’s national president JP Nadda and Home Minister Amit Shah, party leaders said on Thursday. Several leaders have already given their consent to join the campaign that will pick up after road shows in all 14 districts on November 20, they said, adding each road show will be at least 1.5 km long.

Union Ministers, including Rajnath Singh, Nitin Gadkari, Smriti Irani, Piyush Goyal, Kiren Rijiju and Anurag Thakur are also expected to campaign for polls to the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD). The list will be issued soon after receiving approval from the national leadership.

The Delhi BJP also brought out a “charge sheet” against the AAP government accusing it of failing to fulfill its promises. Reading out the “charge sheet” at a press conference, senior BJP leader Ramvir Singh Bidhuri claimed the issues raised in it were verified, and challenged AAP convener Arvind Kejriwal to have a debate on it with him.

“In 8 years of its rule, Kejriwal government turned Delhi into the most polluted national capital in the world, and also a capital of addiction by allowing liquor shops in every street of the city,” Bidhuri charged.

Himachal Elections 2022

As the crucial Himachal Pradesh assembly went for a single-phase voting on November 12, it registered a record voter turnout at 75.6 per cent, according to data available with state poll authorities on Sunday. The state continued to receive postal ballots after physical voting ended.

More women came out to vote at 76.8 per cent as compared to 72.4 per cent men. The third gender poll percentage was 68.4 per cent. The highest polling percentage of 85.25 per cent was reported from the Doon assembly constituency and Shimla assembly constituency had percentage at 62.53.

The high octane assembly poll is a crucial test for the BJP which is hoping to beat precedent and return to power while the Congress has urged voters to go by tradition of voting out the incumbent.

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