Ahmedabad:
In a bid to change its political future, the Congress, forced into lengthy service as the Opposition in Gujarat, has decided to relocate.
The party's headquarters will move over the weekend to a four-storey building in Western Ahmedabad, which, according to top leaders, has been
vaastu-enabled on the orders of Bharatsinh Solanki, who took over as state president of the Congress about six months ago.
Next month, civic body elections will be held in seven key cities including Surat, Ahmedabad and Gandhinagar. The Congress holds none of them. Whether a geographical regrouping will exert a new pull will, therefore, be tested in weeks.
Since 1987, the party office has been based in Eastern Ahmedabad; in 2003, the workspace went through a thorough overhaul. By then, the Congress had been effectively demolished - it last governed Gujarat on its own in 1987 with Amarsinh Chaudhary as Chief Minister. Today, in the assembly, it has just 58 of 182 seats.
"There were several deficiencies as per
vaastu (feng-shui) in the old headquarters and that is why Bharatbhai consulted
vaastu experts and chose this building. We are sure it will lift morale and bring in more luck,'' said Bhavin Vyas, a top Congress leader.
Ahead of the last lok sabha elections in 2014, the BJP had also shifted its headquarters from the Old City area in Ahmedabad to a swanky new office in state capital, Gandhinagar. Privately, party sources admitted
vaastu as a motivating factor for the shift. But on record, leaders said the old party office was too small.