Cash & Dhol: Ravindra Jadeja celebrates wife Rivaba's Gujarat election victory; WATCH

Indian all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja's wife Rivaba on Thursday won the Vidhan Sabha elections in Gujarat. She defeated AAP’s Karsanbhai Karmur and Congress' Bipendrasinh Jadeja to become an MLA from the Jamnagar North constituency. Jadeja, who extensively campaigned for Rivaba, celebrated her victory by flying cash at dhol players. In a video going viral on social media, Jadeja can be seen throwing money at a group of dhol players, who had come to mark his wife's astounding election victory. 

Rivaba bagged 88,119 votes, AAP’s Karsanbhai secured 34,818 votes and Congress’ Bipendrasinh came third as he managed to get only 23,088 votes, according to the Election Commission. In a massive victory for the saffron party in Gujarat, all previous records have been broken as BJP surpassed Congress’ previous best performance of 149 seats by winning 156 seats in the 182-seat assembly. Congress, on the other hand, has been reduced to just 17 seats, while Aam Aadmi Party managed just 5 seats. 

"The image of Prime Minister Narendra Modi had a major impact on the poll results. The poll results show people of Gujarat want to continue the decades-old development journey with the BJP. The love of the people of Gujarat towards PM Narendra Modi, from his journey as a CM to becoming the PM, has progressively increased over the years, the world over people of Gujarat love him and this image of him has had a natural impact on the election result. My priority will be to make a collective effort with other legislators to take the development agenda of the state forward," Rivaba said after securing the victory on Thursday. 

When will Jadeja return for Team India?

As far as Jadeja is concerned, the Gujarat-born all-rounder was due to play in the three-match ODI series against Bangladesh but missed out as he was still recovering from knee surgery. He was replaced by Shahbaz Ahmed in the ODI squad. Jadeja was also named in the Indian Test squad for the Bangladesh tour but is now expected to miss the two-match series as well. Jadeja was last seen in action during the 2022 Asia Cup, a tournament he was forced to exit early after sustaining a knee injury. 

Image: Instagram/RavindraJadeja