It has been reported that three hundred and ninety seven crorepati candidates are now in the fray for the Gujarat Elections happening from 9th December to 14th December, it has been shown during an analysis of the election definitions by the affidavits of the candidates.
There are a total of about 1,828 candidates who are trying their luck in the Gujrat elections which has two phases, there are 1,098 nominees who have passed class 12 or below. In addition, there are just 118 women candidates in the fray, this has been reported by the Association for Democratic Reforms which is also popular as ADR and also Gujarat Election Watch known as GEW.
It has been reported that 198 out of the total 977 candidates in the first phase have declared assets worth more than Rs 1 crore and 199 nominees out of 851 (which is the total) of second phase have come out as ‘crorepati’ when their affidavits were analysed.
According to the study, about 131 of these 397 ‘crorepati’ candidates have declared their assets which is worth over Rs 5 crore, while 124 others have shown their movable and immovable assets which is in the range of Rs 2 crore to Rs 5 crore.
BJP has given tickets to 142 ‘crorepati’ candidates, while the opposition party (Congress) has fielded about 127 such nominees. The NCP has also given tickets to 17 crorepati candidates, AAP has fielded 13 such candidates and BSP has fielded five such candidates.
The report has said that there were 56 independent candidates which fall under this category. The remaining ‘crorepati’ candidates belonged to the lesser famous parties. Congress candidate for Daskroi seat, Mr Pankaj Patel has been found to be the wealthiest candidate with his assets (declared) worth Rs 231.93 crore. After this, there is one other Congress nominee, Indranil Rajyaguru of Rajkot, contending for the West seat, who has declared his +assets worth Rs 141.22 crore.
Rajyaguru is followed by BJP candidate for Botad seat Saurabh Patel. Patel, who is also former Gujarat finance minister, has declared assets worth Rs 123.78 crore, the report confirmed.
The BJP candidate and a prominent businessman Dhanjibhai Patel of Wadhwan seat is in the fourth place with declared assets of Rs 113.47 crore.In a sharp contrast, there are six other independent candidates who have declared that they have ‘zero’ movable or immovable assets.