BJP…BJP…BJP, was the only name which was all over in Radhanpur chaukadi, a famous market place in Mehsana. People were found to be happy with the BJP rule and a majority of people favored the policies of BJP government.
Team Jan Ki Baat led by Founder and CEO Mr. Pradip Bhandari, turned its wheels on the way to Radhanpur chaukadi, Mehsana which is known as home ground of Nitin bhai Patel. Reporter Jay Ji and Shadab Khan were also there to get the pulse of the people.
Our team spoke with street vendors, buyers, shopkeepers and even chai walas to know about the ground reality. However some people did talk about congress and Hardik Patel doing some magic this time but majority of people were found to be supportve of Nitin bhai Patel. The team noticed that Mehsana people are fully confident that the BJP will return to power in the upcoming assembly elections.
Patel community is in majority in Mehsana district and they have been supporting local leader Nitin Patel (who also happens to be the sitting deputy chief-minister) for many years now. However, recently an agitation garnered much attention and it resulted into an andolan with Hardik Patel becoming its star-leader. Now there are several questions raised like, will it (the patidar andolan) affect BJP and Nitin Patel’s prospects in the coming eledtions? Or will it only be a political bubble? Team Jan Ki Baat tried to find answers to these questions with its deep ground reporting.
We started our live streaming with a street vendor selling some fruits.
“Jo congress bta rhi hai ki vikas pagal ho gya hai wo bilkul galat hai. Vikas to hua hai”, she said.
Another woman fruit seller looked very happy with PM Modi.
“Modi to hmesha acha hi krte hain desh ke liye“, she said.
On the question of congress slogan ‘vikas pagal ho gya hai’ she confidenly said
“Desh pagal ho gya hai vikas nahi”
These early opinions were sufficient enough to describe the whole atmosphere of Mehsana.
Next we entered a tea stall. The chaiwala told us in Gujarati that he only wants better governance in the state. On the question of Rahul Gandhi he said “people come here and promise a lot but do nothing.” Moving forward, we entered another tea stall where the vendor said that “There will be a tight contest between BJP and congress this time”.
We moved further to a hardware store and asked about the effect of GST and demonitisation. The owner of the store was completely satisfied with the implementation of GST thus neglecting any negative impact on business. Some other people openly supported GST and demonitisation.
- A hardware store owner talking about GST
Our next question was about Anamat issue and Hardik Patel. Although some people defended Hardik Patel and his demand but they were not sure whether he will make any difference. People were very well aware about the Constitutional process to get reservations. Therefore they did not seem to go against BJP on anamat issue.
After a 46 minute live reporting and several hours of offline interaction with more than 150 people of Mehsana, it became clear to our team that 75% people had a clear and positive opinion about BJP and they clearly denied the probable effect of Rahul Gandhi’s rally and Hardik Patel’s andolan on BJP prospects in the state. However the scenario was surprisingly different just across the road where Jan Ki Baat founding Partner Akriti Bhatia was interacting with the local people; many of whom were hopeful that this time Congress would come to power and make a difference. This video of the same could be seen below.
Reported by Pradip Bhandari, Jay & Shadab
Story by Shadab Khan & Sparsh Upadhyay
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