(NOTE: This article was originally published in the India Today issue July 28, 2014)
A proven performer on home turf Gujarat he might have been, but when Amit Shah was tasked with delivering in the land of Mulayam and Mayawati for BJP in the General Election, even admirers thought it was beyond Narendra Modi’s chief aide. The astute strategist took charge of the party’s campaign in the state less than a year before polls and yet effected a remarkable turnaround for a party that had not only shrunk electorally but also lost its grassroots cadre drastically after the high of the 1990s.
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Seventy-one out of 80 seats in Uttar Pradesh not only pitchforked BJP into power but gave it the numbers needed for decisive governance after a prolonged coalition era. Shah’s elevation as BJP president is not only thanksgiving for his Uttar Pradesh bumper harvest but signals an aide-mentor duopoly that will keep party and Government in sync. BJP’s youngest-ever president speaks to Senior Editor Uday Mahurkar at the government guesthouse in Ahmedabad about the challenges that lie ahead
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