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Journalism of Courage
It was widely believed that when in 2017, Mahendrasinh Vaghela followed the footsteps of his father, former chief minister Shankersinh Vaghela, and quit the Congress, it was because the father wanted to cement the son’s stuttering political career.
Mahendrasinh, then a Congress MLA from Bayad in the Aravalli district, was among the 14 MLAs, including his father –then the Leader of the Opposition in the Gujarat Assembly — who had quit ahead of the Rajya Sabha election, in which the late Ahmed Patel was seeking re-election.
On Friday Mahendrasinh returned to the Congress, where he had begun his career in electoral politics, though the party high command has cold-shouldered Shankersinh’s signals to return.
Sources, however, say the son’s return signifies a “backdoor entry” for Shankersinh into the party. Given his oratorical skills, he is even expected to campaign for Mahendrasinh, if the latter were to contest the elections. Congress sources say there is a good chance he will. “His former constituency of Bayad can be considered for Mahendrasinh’s ticket. Other options include Dehgam, Abdasa or even Gandhinagar,” said a party source.
Mahendrasinh, 58, who describes himself as a “farmer and a social worker” is Shankersinh’s eldest of three children, with son and a daughter after him. The family runs the Shankersinh Vaghela Bapu Charitable Trust that owns the Bapu Gujarat Knowledge Village, an educational campus in Gandhinagar, of which Shankersinh is the chairman and managing trustee, and Mahendrasinh a trustee.
In 2017, Ahmed Patel won by a whisker in a closely fought election, where, pitted against him was former Congress Assembly whip Balwantsinh Rajput, another of the 14 MLAs who followed Vaghela out of the Congress. Rajput, who is now in the BJP, remains connected to the Vaghelas, as his son is married to Mahendrasinh’s daughter.
Mahendrasinh joined the BJP in July 2018, but quit in October the same year. Overshadowed by his veteran RSS-rooted father, who had split the state BJP in 1996 to launch his own party to become the chief minister, Mahendrasinh contested his first Assembly election in 2002, from Sami in Patan district, losing to the BJP. Congress was then fighting the elections under the leadership of Shankersinh, after his Rashtriya Janata Party (RJP) merged with the Congress.
When in BJP, Mahendrasinh was hardly seen or heard, perhaps because he is known to be “soft-spoken” and to keep a low profile. But on Friday, when he returned to the Congress, he said, “I have neither gone to any BJP event nor the party headquarters,” adding that he was always with the Congress in his “mind”.
Mahendrasinh eventually became MLA for the first time in 2007 from Meghraj constituency in Aravalli, when his father was a Union minister in the Manmohan Singh-led UPA government. In 2012, he won again from the Bayad seat in Sabarkantha.
