Those who work closely with Amit Shah say that he is a task master, but equally simple. During the state visits, he stays at the party office and does not believe in 5 star accommodation. If not at the party office, then he stays at the government guest house. He never uses as a chartered aircraft and prefers doing short distances by road.
Image from Outlook
Amit Shah was born in a very prosperous family. His great grandfather was the nagarseth of the princely state of Mansa. However, his parents brought him up with utmost simplicity. For instance, his sisters used to go to school by a bagghi (horse carriage) but he walked to school. Likewise, while his sisters were served food in silver utensils, he was given food only in brass utensils.
He initially helped his father, who was running PVC pipe business. Later, he worked as a stock broker for some time. With this experience, he joined cooperative banks around Ahmedabad.
In 1991 and 1996, Amit Shah managed the election campaign of Lal Krishna Advani and Atal Bihari Vajpayee. This made him an excellent strategist.
Shah was able to do a commendable job of financial management while handling as many as ten different portfolios including Law and Home after Narendra Modi’s victory in the Gujarat assembly polls of 2002. After this, he was regarded as highly skilled in governance, especially the financial management aspect.
In December 2002, when Narendra Modi first crushed the Congress to win a record 126 seats in the 182-member Gujarat Assembly, Amit Shah won by the highest margin of votes, over 1.58 lakh and even higher than Modi himself. His constituency, Sarkhej, elected Amit Shah again in 2007; he bettered the margin of victory winning by 2.35 lakh votes. In 2012, there was no Sarkhej thanks to delimitation, but Shah won from Naranpura, setbacks to his career notwithstanding.
A strict vegetarian, Shah is a nonsmoker and a teetotaller. He remembers both friends and adversaries, and knows most party workers by name. He insists that office-bearers sit at the party’s 11 Ashoka Road headquarters. He himself ensures that he spends long hours in his office when he is in Delhi. Probably this is the reason why he has taken up the ambitious project of building BJP offices in all 640 districts of India.
Shah believes in three things- Karyakarta, vichardara and karyalaya. This means he understands the importance of the workers, the commitment to ideology and the value of the workplace.
Recently, during a visit to Rohtak, Haryana, while speaking to vistaraks (full-time workers), Shah stunned everyone when he said, “I don’t want you to work if you think you are doing this to win elections or make someone CM or PM. Instead, you should do this to make India Vishva Guru (world leader).”
We all know that PM Modi and Amit Shah work in close coordination and have the highest of regards for each other.
Shah’s journey so far has been an amazing one. But the 2019 general elections will prove to be an ultimate test for him.
Sources: oneindia, awaaznation, ET, rozbuzz, electionfacts