Gujarat Katargam Results 2022: AAP state chief Italia losing in Katargam, BJP's Vinod Moradiya leading with nearly 60% votes

Gujarat Katargam Results 2022: The state president of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), Gopal Italia, seems to be loosing to the sitting BJP MLA Vinod Moradiya in Katargam seat in Surat, the diamond and textile hub that the party had sought to make its launch pad for entering Gujarat's poll arena.

After 14 rounds of counting votes, Italia was trailing Moradiya by a margin of more than 45,000 votes. He had polled 45424 votes, compared to 96469 votes polled by the BJP candidate as per the updates released by the Election Commission at 1:45pm. Congress candidate Kalpesh Variya, with only 5,868 votes cast in his favour, was finishing a distant third. Italia was one of the high-profile candidates and Katargam was considered a favorable seat for the AAP as it expected to cash in on an apparent disillusionment with the BJP among diamond and textile workers from the Patidar community of Saurashtra. The AAP's Gujarat ambitions got a boost last year when it sprung a surprise performance in Surat civic body polls, winning 27 councilor seats.

Congress candidate Variya, who belongs to the OBC Prajapati community, has failed to make any dent and as expected, the fight remained between BJP and AAP. Ever since the seat came into existence in 2012 following delimitation, Katargam has voted for the BJP. Thursday's counting trends showed that the party was set to continue its victory streak. Moradiya, who won the seat in 2017, served as the minister of state for urban development and urban housing in the Bhupendra Patel government. In the 2017 election, he defeated Congress candidate Jignesh Jivani by a margin of more than 79,000 votes. The Congress had then failed to tap the resentment among the Patidar community over the reservation agitation. Katargam has a total of 3.18 lakh voters, of whom Patidars form the largest community followed by Prajapati, who are OBCs. Most Patidars, settled in the region, are engaged in diamond and textile units. The Arvind Kejriwal-led party tried to woo diamond polishers and other segments of voters with its "guarantees" of free electricity of up to 300 units, free and quality education and healthcare, and unemployment allowance, among others. As the result shows, these promises failed to sway voters in the party's favour.

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