Gujarat polls: Ahmedabad school to roll out the red carpet for Modi to vote on Thursday

On Thursday, PM Narendra Modi will be in Ahmedabad, Gujarat to cast his vote during the final phase of polling for the Gujarat Assembly elections.

Gandhinagar, Dec 13: It's not often that the little-known school, Nishan Vidyalaya in Ranip area of Ahmedabad, Gujarat, gets to host India's topmost VIP.

On Thursday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be standing in a queue along with the rest of voters to cast his precious vote in the school which has been turned into a polling booth for the second and final phase of voting for the Gujarat Assembly elections 2017.

After wrapping up his whirlpool tour of Gujarat, campaigning for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for four consecutive days, the PM came back to Delhi on Tuesday.

However, on Thursday, he will be once again heading to Gujarat to vote instead of campaigning for the saffron party. It has been a month since Modi has been relentlessly campaigning in his hometown for the all-important elections in the state where he was the chief minister for almost 13 years from 2001 to 2014 till he shifted to the national capital to become the country's PM after the BJP's massive win in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections.

Gujarat will be voting for 93 Assembly seats on Thursday after having polled in 89 constituencies on Saturday. The counting of votes for Gujarat Assembly elections will be held on December 18.

Many other senior state and national leaders of the BJP will also be in Ahmedabad to cast their votes, stated reports.

BJP president Amit Shah too will be in the city to cast his vote from his former assembly constituency, Naranpura. He had vacated the seat to contest for a Rajya Sabha seat from the state earlier this year.

Another Rajya Sabha member from the BJP representing Gujarat--Union finance minister Arun Jaitley--will be in the city to cast his vote from Vejalpur region of Ahmedabad.

Former deputy PM and veteran BJP leader LK Advani too will be in Ahmedabad to cast his vote from Khanpur area. The sitting MLA from Abdasa and Congress candidate from Mandvi, Shaktisinh Gohil, will be casting his vote in Gandhinagar.

State Congress president Bharatsinh Solanki will exercise his voting right in Borsad town of Kheda district. Another Congress candidate Siddharth Patel will be casting his vote from Dabhoi.

Thus on Thursday, along with hosting elections, Ahmedabad will be welcoming a bevvy of VIPs who are going to visit the city to vote.

In the last few weeks, Gujarat is witnessing a high-voltage campaign as both the BJP and the Congress are fighting a tough battle to win the elections. The state is under the rule of the BJP for the last 22 years.

As the Congress, headed by its newly-elected president Rahul Gandhi, is trying its best to unseat the BJP from its citadel, the BJP on its part also pulled up a massive campaign in the state headed by Modi.

The campaigning for the final leg of polling ended on Tuesday. The saffron party's star campaigner PM Modi started the last day of campaigning for Gujarat elections on Tuesday aboard a seaplane en route to Ambaji Temple. Rahul addressed a press conference in Ahmedabad.

The last day of campaigning saw both Modi and Rahul visiting temples. While Rahul visited the Lord Jagannath temple in Ahmedabad, Modi took blessings at Ambaji temple in Banaskantha.

The first phase of polling saw 66.75 percent turnout. In the 182-member Gujarat Assembly, the BJP had won 115 seats and the Congress 61 in 2012.

This year's Gujarat elections will be remembered for "low-level" campaigning where both the BJP and the Congress attacked each other with unparliamentary language and wild allegations.

Now, voters are waiting to give their verdict as which party deserves to rule them in Gujarat on Thursday.

OneIndia News