Nagarmal Bajoria, a Bihar businessman known for contesting nearly 300 elections, has died at the ripe age of 97, his family said on Friday.According to close family members, the Bhagalpur resident, who boasted of having challenged former prime ministers Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi on their home turfs of Rae Bareli and Amethi, respectively, breathed his last at a hospital in Patna on Thursday, following prolonged illness.His body was brought to Bhagalpur, where the last rites were performed on Friday.Hailing from western Punjab, which now falls in Pakistan, Bajoria was among the millions of refugees who fled their homes during the horrific communal violence that marked Partition.After settling down in the east Bihar town, which in those days was known for a thriving textile industry, Bajoria is said to have decided to make himself count in the nascent republic by becoming the proverbial perennial candidate, thereby earning the epithet “dharti pakad”.”He contested close to 300 elections, insisting every time that he wanted to raise public awareness that polls were about the people and not power”, said Gaurav, a grandson of Bajoria.Gaurav recalled his grandfather contesting the 2005 Bihar Assembly polls, when the RJD was voted out of power, “donning clothes on which anti-corruption slogans were printed, and an old wristwatch proudly claimed to date back to the times of Mahatma Gandhi.”My grandfather never joined a political party and first contested a municipal election in 1960. Of course, he came to be known across the country nine years later when he filed nomination papers for the Presidential poll, which was won by VV Giri,” Gaurav said.Apart from the Gandhis, other prominent leaders against whom Bajoria contested included former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, his deputy LK Advani and former president Pranab Mukherji.Old residents recall Bajoria “making headlines by hitting the campaign trail with placards inscribed with names of well-known politicians placed around the necks of donkeys. He was also known to distribute dried fruits among people”.Age eventually caught up with Bajoria, whose last widely discussed electoral venture was filing nomination papers for the 2012 Presidential election.”His refrain used to be — it is not I who loses elections, it is the people who are losing every time. He wanted to contest the 2024 Lok Sabha polls from more than one seat, with Patna and Rae Bareli being his preferred constituencies. But failing health came in the way,” Gaurav said.