How the IFFCO election bared fault lines in Gujarat BJP

Deep political fault lines within the BJP have started showing up within days of the Lok Sabha polling in Gujarat. At the May 9 elections for the Board of Directors of IFFCO (Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative Limited), the BJP’s Jetpur MLA Jayesh Radadiya defeated party colleague Bipin Patel (alias Gota). The latter had the BJP mandate to contest the elections.

The Board of Directors of IFFCO represent the primary agricultural cooperative societies (PACS) of their region at the cooperative’s headquarters in Delhi.

Radadiya was seeking reelection to the post with the support of outgoing IFFCO chairman Dileep Sanghani, a former MP and MLA from Amreli in Saurashtra. Gota filed his nomination three days after Radadiya and a showdown was on the cards. The party mandate notwithstanding, Sanghani is believed to have supported Radadiya, resulting in 113 of 180 votes from Gujarat cast in his favour. Two members remained absent while 67 votes went to Patel. Sanghani himself was reelected IFFCO chairman for a second term.

The May 9 elections for 21 directors of IFFCO were held at its Delhi headquarters. IFFCO oversees the functioning of over 36,000 cooperative societies across the country, reaching over 50 million farmers.

The electoral drama left Gujarat BJP president C.R. Paatil red-faced. Paatil alleged Sanghani had sided with members of ‘other parties’, invoking Jayesh and his father Vitthal Radadiya’s roots in the Congress. The late Vitthal Radadiya had joined the BJP in 2013.

Radadiya and Sanghani have denied allegations of defiance as they claim they are committed to the BJP and not any other party. “I am a dedicated BJP worker, which will be evident when the BJP will get a striking lead in the Porbandar seat from my assembly constituency. I worked hard to ensure it,” Radadiya said.

Sanghani reminded Paatil about the induction of various Congress and Aam Aadmi Party leaders into the BJP in the run-up to the Lok Sabha polls and how they were immediately given tickets to contest elections. Another interesting facet of this controversy is that Gota is considered to be Union home minister Amit Shah’s confidant.

The IFFCO election is noteworthy for two other reasons—one, the BJP lately giving a mandate to leaders to contest cooperative sector elections. The core of the cooperative movement was to keep politics out of the democratic process to empower the people. That leaders who emerged from the cooperative bodies as elected representatives were wooed by political parties and started engaging in an active electoral career was deemed unfortunate by observers when it started a few years ago. But for a political party to issue a mandate for contesting elections of a cooperative society is a new watershed, which is expected to have far-reaching consequences.

The other is the widening fault lines within the BJP’s senior leadership. For the BJP to issue a mandate to Patel even though party MLA Radadiya had already filed a nomination for reelection speaks volumes about the communication channels in the top echelons of the party in Gujarat. In the state’s political circles, these developments are tracked with great interest in the context of the protests the party witnessed when its candidates were announced.

The BJP had to change the contestants on two seats—Vadodara and Sabarkantha. Besides, it faced protests from functionaries on at least half a dozen seats. The demand was a similar change of candidate, but the party did not yield.

One such outburst that has caught the attention is of outgoing Amreli MP Naran Kachhadiya, who vented his angst at a gathering of workers, criticising the party’s decision to replace his candidature with zilla panchayat president Bharat Sutariya. He also criticised the party’s decision to induct Opposition leaders in huge numbers, who got opportunities to enjoy positions of power in the government and party at the cost of party workers dedicated for over three decades. Kachhadiya also alluded to the dip in the voter turnout, insinuating, ironically for a ruling party MP, that people were disillusioned with the BJP.

“We (BJP) have a huge army of workers, yet are not satisfied. In 2019, we did not control zilla, taluka panchayats, and neither did we have any MLAs after the 2017 assembly polls from Amreli Lok Sabha seat. Yet we won the Amreli seat in 2019 by 200,000 votes. This time, the voter turnout has dropped by 150,000 votes. This is because of people’s apathy and BJP functionaries’ indifference, as they do not like what is happening,” said Kachhadiya, resonating Sanghani’s allegations about the huge influx of Opposition leaders into the BJP.

The induction of Congress leaders into the BJP has remained the theme of several unsavoury public exchanges of late in Gujarat. Candidates of four of the five assembly constituencies for which bypolls were held on May 7 were Congress turncoats.

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