the tribal seats changed hands literally this time by showing congress the door in 23 of its 27 reserved seats the tribal belt of the state which had been a traditional congress votebank was left with only three seats while the tribal electorate reposed its faith in aap on one seatthe bjp swept the polls in this region including annexing two seats which it has won for the first timethe 27 tribal seats of the eastern belt of the state popularly called the purvapatti by political parties extending from the danta seat in north gujarat to the umbargaon seat in south gujarat witnessed a highprofile campaign by political partiesthe bjp had a clean sweep on the st seats in central gujarat winning on all 10 of them these included the jhalod seat in dahod district that the party had won only once earlier in 2002 the party won all the five st seats in dahod where the congress had earlier won on three the bjp also won on one st seat each in the panchmahal and mahisagar districtsthe chhota udepur district also went to the bjp pocket where the party won all three seats the congress had held two of these after the 2017 pollsone of the key victories for bjp was the chhota udepur seat where 11timecongress mla mohansinh rathwa quit his party and joined the bjp mohansinhs son rajendra was fielded by the bjp in chhota udepur which he won by 29450 votes defeating former railway mos naransinh rathwas son sangramsinh fighting on congress ticketleader of opposition is gujarat assembly sukhram rathwa faced a drubbing on the pavijetpur seat as he finished third with a margin of 52369 votes to jayanti rathwa radhika rathwa a congress rebel who contested from aap finished second and lost by 37779 votes in sankheda sitting bjp mla abhesinh tadvi continued his winning streak by defeating dhiru bhilin south gujarat the bjp won on 12 seats out of 14 even as the congress and aap got one eachin narmada district the bjp wrested one seat from congress while the aap took another in nandod bjps darshana deshmukh wrested the seat back from congress while aap candidate chaitar vasava won in dediapada by a margin of 40282 votes defeating bjps hitesh vasavaamong major upsets in tribal areas of south gujarat bjp won vyara for the first time in electoral historybjps mohan kokani got 69633 votes against aaps 47513 votes while threeterm sitting mla of congress punaji gamit got 45904 votes this seat had sent former congress cm amarsinh chaudhary to the assembly from 1972 to 1985 elections later in 2002 chaudharys son tushar won as congress candidate since 2007 gamit had been winning the seatjhagadia in bharuch district was another seat where the bjp won for the first time seventerm mla from jhagadia independent chhotu vasava lost to bjps ritesh vasava by 23500 votes in jhagadia aaps urmila bhagat secured 19722 and fatehsingvasava of congress got 15219 votes vasava contested as an independent after