Anandiben Patel seems to have left behind a dug-up pitch for her successor. While some of her populist measures face legal hurdles, others appear ill-thought-out. The State has also lost some of its sheen as an investment-friendly destination, not to mention the political challenges that the incoming Chief Minister faces from the Dalits and the BJP’s once-core-constituency of Patels.
The 10 per cent quota for Economically Backward Classes that Anandiben had introduced, as a fallout of the Patidar reservation agitation, has been challenged in the Gujarat High Court. A similar challenge would be the former Chief Minister’s latest announcement on toll tax exemption for private cars and small vehicles on Gujarat’s highways, barely two days before her resignation. However, the move remains ambiguous as the detailing of the decision has not been finalised by the government.
Anandiben’s two-year tenure faced one of the State’s longest labour unrests in recent times, at the Tata Motors’ Nano plant in Sanand. Notably, it was a text message from Modi that had convinced Ratan Tata to choose Gujarat for the company’s small car plant, after it faced resistance in West Bengal’s Singur. The strike lasted a month and brought various unions together. When it was called off a month later, it had sullied the industry-friendly image of the State.
Women empowerment To her credit, Anandiben’s legacy will be the creation of schemes for women’s development. She announced schemes such as 100 per cent fee waiver for girl students in their first year of medical education, and also the provision of ₹1 lakh assistance to girl students preparing for civil services examinations.
The free-of-cost diagnosis and treatment for women having breast cancer and cervical cancer, earned Patel a good name. Following her thrust for women empowerment, Finance Minister Saurabh Patel presented three gender budgets, where women safety, empowerment and self reliance was given primary importance.
But the Congress winning 21 of 31 district panchayats that went to polls, was a political setback for the BJP, although it managed to retain the urban centres. The latest Dalit agitation, triggered by the public flogging of youths from the community in Una in Gir-Somnath, early last month proved fatal for the Anandiben administration.