Gujarat polls: Daily wager contesting as independent pays Rs 10,000 deposit to EC in Re 1 coins

A daily wage worker whose slum colony in Gujarat capital Gandhinagar was razed in 2019 to make way for a hotel, raised Rs 10,000 in Re 1 coins from his supporters and deposited that amount with the Election Commission so that he can contest the next months Assembly polls. Mahendra Patni, who is fighting the election from the Gandhinagar North seat as an independent candidate, paid the security deposit in coins earlier this week.

He said the displaced residents of 521 huts in a slum near Mahatma Mandir in Gandhinagar that were demolished three years ago, asked him to contest the election as their representative. Patni was one of the residents of the slum which was twice displaced, first in 2010 when the government constructed the Dandi Kutir museum dedicated to Mahatma Gandhi not far from the hotel and then in 2019 when slum-dwellers were again forced to shift to a nearby area so that the hotel can be constructed on the land.

“I am contesting as an independent. I belong to a family of labourers and make my living as a daily wager. There were 521 huts which were razed to make way for a big hotel. Many of them were rendered jobless. We shifted to a nearby area, but have no water or electricity supply,” he told

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