Gujarat assembly elections 2022 Bhupendra Patel profile
Gujarat CM Bhupendra Patel, a Kadva Patidar leader and first-time MLA from Ahmedabad, has been described by PM Modi as 'soft and firm'
The 60-year-old first-time MLA from Ahmedabad, Bhupendra Patel has spent most of his political career in urban local bodies as the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) Standing Committee chairman as well as the Ahmedabad Urban Development Authority (AUDA) head. The BJP, which has been ruling Gujarat for over 25 years continuously, had just managed to get a simple majority when it won 99 of the total 182 seats in the 2017 Assembly polls.
Tasked by the BJP leadership with ensuring a “glitch-free” governance and steer the saffron dispensation smoothly through the crucial Gujarat Assembly polls slated for December this year, Patel, a low-profile leader, has his task cut out.
On October 1, C R Paatil, the high-profile state BJP chief, said Patel will be “repeated” for another chief ministerial term as he has done “good work”.
Patel’s one-year tenure at the helm of the Gujarat government has been marked with several notable developments and rows, which include two ministers, Rajendra Trivedi and Purnesh Modi, being recently stripped of important portfolios, agitations by government employees on various issues, paper leak of a government recruitment exam, cattle being hit by the lumpy skin disease in 26 of the state’s 33 districts, deaths of 42 people in a hooch tragedy, a record 21000-kg drug seizure from the Mundra port, the remission of 11 convicts in the Bilkis Bano gangrape case, and the scrapping of a bill meant to control the stray cattle menace following strong protests by Maldharis (cattle rearers) against it.
According to his election affidavit, Patel has got a diploma in civil engineering and runs a construction firm formerly called Vihan Associates, which is managed by his son and son-in-law. The firm has now been renamed as Ansh Construction.
Rating: 5