Denying any row over his seat, veteran BJP leader L K Advani today said he never thought of not contesting from his traditional Lok Sabha seat of Gandhinagar and recalled his long association with Gujarat.
“Our friends from Madhya Pradesh wanted me to contest from Bhopal also. But I have never intended not contesting from Gandhinagar,” he said, denying there was any row over the constituency from where he wanted to fight the election.
There were reports that the former Deputy PM had expressed desire to shift his constituency from Gandhinagar to Bhopal but was later virtually forced to contest from the Gujarat capital following intervention of RSS and the party.
The five-time MP, who will file his nomination later in the day, said contesting from Gandhinagar is “absolutely rejoicing” and traced his decades-old association with the state.
“After all my relations with Gandhinagar and with Gujarat did not start with my contesting from here. They started with unfortunate incident that accompanied India’s independence,” Advani said, referring to the partition after which he and his family moved to India from Pakistan.
“My father stepped in Adipur (a Kutch township where Advani and his family moved after the Partition) for a brief while. He then moved to Kashi (Banaras or modern-day Varanasi), where my grandmother wanted to spend her last days.
“He was there for 3-4 four years and then shifted to Adipur. This is the background of my and my family’s association with Gujarat,” he said.
Advani will be accompanied by BJP’s Prime ministerial nominee Narendra Modi when he files his papers.
The 86-year-old BJP leader is scheduled to address party workers in Koba area of Gandhinagar in the afternoon and also inaugurate his party’s constituency office.
–PTI