Gujarat Elections: Amit Shah meets BJP leaders, seeks suggestions to win all 52 seats in Central zone

Gandhinagar, Oct 23: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Sunday met Bharatiya Janata Party functionaries of the central Gujarat zone comprising eight districts here to discuss strategies for the Assembly polls, due in December this year.

Those present at the meeting have been asked to give suggestions by November 3 on how the party can win all 52 Assembly seats in the eight districts that comprise the central Gujarat zone, BJP sources said.

The meeting lasted for nearly four hours in a hotel in Vadodara, they informed.

The BJP, which has been in power in the state for close to three decades, has set a target to win 150 of the total 182 seats. If the party could pull off this feat, it would break the 1985 record of 149 seats won by Congress under Madhavsinh Solanki.

Chief Minister Bhupendra Patel, Gujarat BJP president CR Paatil, and party general secretary of the organisation in Gujarat, Ratnakar, were also present at the meeting.

Shah offered guidance and discussed strategies with MLAs, MPs, district BJP presidents, panchayat presidents, Vadodara city mayor and heads of various cooperatives who attended the meeting, party sources said.

Shah met party leaders of the south Gujarat zone in Valsad on Saturday. On Monday, he will interact with BJP functionaries of the north Gujarat zone in Palanpur.

In the 2017 Assembly polls, the BJP had won 99 seats, while the opposition Congress improved its tally to 77.