Caste, jobs, Modi: Debutant voters talk politics

Mehsana (Gujarat): Mehsana, the hub of the Patidar agitation, is a sometimes bumpy 35-km bus ride from Vadnagar, the hometown of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

A group of chatty youngsters hop on to a creaky Vadnagar-bound bus of the Gujarat State Transport Corporation, which lumbers off the unpaved Mehsana terminus, leaving a trail of dust.

The conductor struggles to make himself heard in the raucous group, mostly B.Sc. students in a local college voting for the first time on December 14, phase two of the Gujarat polls.

Mehsana and Vadnagar fall in Mehsana district. However, Vadnagar falls in the Unjha constituency while Mehsana city is a separate constituency.

But politics is not uppermost in their minds. The first-time voters, who form a crucial voting block of 12 lakh, seem to be just waking up to political consciousness — somewhat like the faint fuzz on their upper lip.

Ashish Patel and Jashavant Sinh are best friends. But adulthood has made them discover that their political views are poles apart, one pushing for reservation for the Patel community and the other veering towards the BJP.

Ashish, a Kadva Patel (a subcaste of the Patidars or Patels), is an ardent supporter of Hardik Patel, the firebrand leader of the Patidar Amanat Andolan Samiti (PAAS), which has been fighting for reservation and has come out in support of the Congress.

The 21-year-old is the son of a land-owning farmer in Visnagar, a major pitstop between Mehsana and Vadnagar.

“Patels are not necessarily wealthy. None of us has government jobs. The land we own is not enough to feed our entire family. That is why we need reservations,” says Ashish, justifying his support for Hardik Patel.

According to him, a false perception that Patels are dominant in all spheres of society has gained traction, leaving the economically backward among them in the lurch.

Patels form around 12 per cent of the electorate and among them Kadvas, to which Hardik and Ashish belong, are fewer in number.