Santosh Gangwar, Chhatrapal Singh Gangwar
– Photo: Amar Ujala
Expansion
The ‘Santosh era’ has come to an end in Bareilly after the list of BJP candidates for the Lok Sabha elections was released on Sunday. Santosh Gangwar, who had contested elections 10 times and won eight times, lost his 11th candidature due to his advancing age. Now for the time being he will be seen in the role of guidance board in the party. The responsibility of handling his legacy will be of Chhatrapal Gangwar of his own community. In this way, the influence of Gangwar i.e. Kurmi community will also remain in the party on Bareilly seat.
By the way, the candidature of Santosh Gangwar was in question from the very beginning in this election. The biggest hurdle was his age of 75 years. After becoming a minister at the Centre, the fear of ticket being cut had become stronger. However, his supporters had made a strong claim. Apart from age, he had no opposition from the area. This was the reason that despite there being candidates on many seats in the state, the ticket for Bareilly was declared late. There was discussion regarding tickets from Lucknow to Delhi.
Experts say that the party canceled Santosh’s ticket, but did not ignore his community. Because there are about 3.5 lakh votes of Gangwar community in Bareilly seat. In the five assembly constituencies falling in this Lok Sabha constituency, Bareilly City, Cantt, Nawabganj, Mirganj, Bhojipura, there is a majority of Gangawar votes of the Kurmi community. Not only this, this community also has a significant number of voters in Pilibhit and surrounding seats. That is why, keeping in mind the caste arithmetic, the party fielded Chhatrapal Gangwar, who was MLA from Baheri.