An old rival returns, Gujarat ‘giant-killer’ answers Cong call

Incontrasttotherecenthistory of squabbling for tickets within the Gujarat Congress, a different story is unfolding in Rajkot this time. A dozen or so local leaders drove to Paresh Dhanani’s residence in Amreli on April 9 to request him to take on the BJP’S Parshottam Rupala in the Lok Saba polls, two decades after his famous victory over the Union Minister.

A reluctant Dhanani agreed and said if Rupala weathered the ongoingkshatriyaprotestsagainst him, he would enter the poll fray. Withrupalafilinghisnomination papers on April 16 amid protests overallegedlyderogatoryremarks about Kshatriyas, Dhanani began his campaign the same day and filed his papers on Friday.

“Dhanani is among a handful of mild-mannered Patidars who are not openly casteist, and is hence acceptable to nonpatidars,” said a Congress leader.

Dhanani had his first brush withpoliticsin1989whenhewas still in school. “A local Congress worker noted my handwriting was good. Before the 1989 Lok Sabha polls, he took me to the Congress office to write voters’ slips. I slipped into politics from then on,” said the 47-year-old.

While in college, Dhanani formed the Students’ Cultural Group of Amreli. In 1997, he founded Parivartan Trust, which hestillruns.thefollowingyear,he was appointed president of the Amrelidistrict’nationalstudents’ Union of India (NSUI), the

Congress student wing.

In 2002, the Congress gave him a ticket from the Amreli Assemblyseat,pittinghimagainst Rupala who was then a minister in Narendra Modi’s state Cabinet. “Amreli was categorised by the

Congress under its internal ‘C’ group as the party hadn’t won it since 1972. However, we managed to win that election,” said Dhanani, who was 26 when he defeated Rupala, then a threetimemlaandrisingstarinthebjp.

After the defeat, Rupala, who belongs to the Kadva Patel subcaste of Patidars, did not contest a direct election for the next 21 years. He became a Rajya Sabha MP and a minister under Modi.

Dhanani, who belongs to the Leuva Patel sub-caste of Patidars, however, could not keep up his winning ways and lost in 2007 to thebjp.fiveyearslater,though,he avenged the defeat.

The Congress subsequently gave Dhanani charge of Bihar ahead of the 2015 Assembly polls and Bengal in the following year before its state elections.

In the 2017 Gujarat Assembly elections,whichwereheldagainst the backdrop of the Patidar quota stir, Dhanani emerged as the key Congress face. The Congress-led alliance won 82 seats, the party’s best-ever showing in Gujarat in morethantwodecades.butitstill fell short of the majority by nine seats. The BJP’S tally shrunk to 99, its worst showing since 1995. Dhanani was appointed the leader of the Congress Legislature Party, becoming the first Patidar to serve as the Leader of the Opposition in the Gujarat Assembly since 1985.

But the momentum fizzled outforthecongressanddhanani. He lost the 2019 Lok Sabha polls as the BJP swept all 26 seats. His resignation as a CLP leader wasa ccepted. The following year, he lost the Assembly polls from Amreli.

Dhanani more or less withdrew to his farm in Amreli. Earlier this month, Dhanani said he would not contest the Lok Sabha. But the party called and he has made it a point to respond.

Express Dhanani (bottom row, second from left) with Congress leaders in Rajkot.