Gujarat Dalit leader Jignesh Mevani after meeting Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi, on 3 November, declared that he will ask his followers “not to vote for BJP”. Gandhi met Mevani in Gujarat’s Navsari.
The Convener of the Rashtriya Dalit Adhikar Manch also joined Rahul Gandhi's ongoing Navsarjan Yatra, news agency ANI reported.
After the meeting, Mevani said, “Rahul Gandhi described 90% of our demands as our constitutional rights”, and they will be included in the manifesto, as per ANI. The Congress vice president is currently on an election campaign tour of south Gujarat.
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Mevani met Rahul Gandhi on the precondition that they discuss the opposition party's stand on various demands of the Dalit community. The Dalit rights campaigner, who has dubbed the BJP "anti-Dalit", had also said he had no plans to join any political party.
I want to make it clear that neither have I joined the Congress nor am I going to join the party in the future. Not just the Congress, I have no plans of joining any other party as of now.Jignesh Mavani
However, the young leader, who shot to fame after the Una Dalit flogging incident in 2016, had added that he was ready to meet Rahul Gandhi to know about the Congress' stand on 17 demands related to his community.
The demands include an allotment of five acres of farmland to the Dalits, alternative employment for those involved in cattle-skinning and manual scavenging, and the release of a probe report into an incident of firing on the community members at Thangadh in Surendranagar district in 2012.
"Since the BJP government is not even ready to hold talks with us on these demands, it is very clear that it is anti-Dalit. And, that is why we are also anti-BJP. But, that does not mean we are joining another party," Mevani had said.
(With inputs from PTI)
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