From RSS cadre to CM

Vijay Rupani, known for his exceptional organisational skills, on Sunday succeeded Anandiben Patel as the chief minister of Gujarat.

Born on August 2, 1956, in Rangoon, Burma (now Myanmar) to Ramniklal Rupani, he grew up in Rajkot where he joined RSS as a school boy. Later, he pursued BA and then LLB.  Coming from the Jain Bania community, Rupani did strike a few deals as a stockbroker before moving to politics.

Rupani, known for his closeness to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP national president Amit Shah, was active in the Jan Sangh and was said to be one of the youngest leaders to be jailed during the Emergency under the Maintenance of Internal Security Act (MISA).

Active in politics since 1987, Rupani learnt his initial lessons from BJP stalwart who hailed from Saurashtra, the late Chimanbhai Shukla. The same year, Rupani was elected as a councillor in the Rajkot Municipal Corporation, and the mayor in 1996. He served as a Rajya Sabha member between 2006 and 2012.

Simultaneously, he was made BJP in charge of the Saurashtra-Kutch region. The party won 40 of the 58 seats from the region. In the 2012 Assembly elections, he consolidated his position nationally by helping Modi form the government for the third time in Gujarat.

When Vajubhai Vala, another Saurashtra strongman from Rajkot, was appointed as Karnataka governor in 2014, Rupani replaced him as legislator of Rajkot West. In November 2015, he was inducted in the Anandiben Cabinet and was handed the surface transport, water resources and labour-employment portfolios.

In February 2016, Rupani was hand-picked by Shah to take over as state party chief at a time when social unrest against the party was out in the open.

The party had also witnessed one of its worst defeats when it lost the elections to the local self-government bodies in rural Gujarat to the Congress. Despite the party’s one-man, one-post norm, Rupani was party president and a minister simultaneously.

Rupani is married to Anjali and has a son and daughter. His son, Rushabh, is an engineering graduate, while his daughter, Radhika, is married and settled in London.