Amit Shah
- In full:
- Amitbhai Anilchandra Shah
- Born:
- October 22, 1964, Bombay (now Mumbai), Maharashtra, India (age 60)
- Also Known As:
- Amitbhai Anilchandra Shah
- Political Affiliation:
- Bharatiya Janata Party
News •
Amit Shah (born October 22, 1964, Bombay (now Mumbai), Maharashtra, India) is an Indian politician and one of the most prominent leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). He has served as the central government minister for home affairs since 2019 and the minister of cooperation since 2021. Shah, the BJP’s top strategist, is considered the architect of its electoral victories since 2014. He is regarded as one of the most powerful yet divisive figures in contemporary Indian politics.
Family and early life
Shah was born into a Gujarati family living in Bombay (now Mumbai). He spent his childhood in the family’s home village, Mansa, in the Baroda region of Gujarat state. He attended a local school and progressed to a college education in Ahmedabad district. His political involvement began at an early age. At 13 he pasted campaign posters for a local candidate in the 1977 general election. At 16 he joined the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a Hindu nationalist organization of which the BJP is the principal political arm.
First years of political career
After joining the RSS, Shah became an active member of its student wing, the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP). He joined the BJP’s youth wing, the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha, in 1987, two years after Narendra Modi, then an ambitious party worker. Shah and the future prime minister would have a long political partnership. During these years, Shah participated in the Ram Janmabhoomi movement, which campaigned for a temple to be built on the site of an existing mosque, the Babri Masjid, in Ayodhya, Uttar Pradesh. The site is believed to have been the birthplace of the divine prince Rama, who is worshipped as an avatar of the Hindu god Vishnu. Shah also participated in the Ekta Yatra (1991), a rally organized by BJP leaders of the time to advance the cause of the Ram Janmabhoomi movement.
In 1992 the Babri Masjid was controversially demolished by a Hindu nationalist mob. A court ruling in 2010 divided the disputed land between Hindus and Muslims, but that decision was overturned in 2019 by the Indian Supreme Court, which entrusted the site exclusively to Hindus and directed the state to grant an alternate site in Ayodhya to the Muslim community. The Ram Mandir, a temple dedicated to Rama, was later built in the mosque’s place by the Modi-led BJP government and inaugurated in January 2024.
Rise to power
Amit Shah’s political ascent mirrors the BJP’s growth story, first in Gujarat and then at a national level. He held various posts in the party’s state chapter and was made vice president in 1999. In the early years, he gained recognition for his management skills and was tasked with overseeing electoral campaigns for BJP leaders Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Lal Krishna Advani when they ran for office from Gandhinagar, Gujarat. Gandhinagar later became Shah’s own constituency in general elections.
Amit Shah is popularly considered a modern-day Chanakya because of his skill as a strategist. Chanakya (flourished 300 bce) was an ancient Indian statesman credited with orchestrating the rise of the Maurya dynasty and writing a political treatise called the Artha-shastra (“The Science of Material Gain”).
In the 1990s the BJP began to wrest power from the Indian National Congress in Gujarat. Shah was a key player during this period of state politics and helped broaden the party’s membership base. He also had a vital role in reducing the Congress Party’s dominance in rural areas.
Gujarat politics
In 1997 Shah fought an election for the first time, winning a by-election from the Sarkhej constituency in Gujarat and becoming a member of the state’s legislative assembly. He retained his seat in the assembly elections of 1998, which the BJP won, and the party formed a government led by Keshubhai Patel.
2002 riots and aftermath
In October 2001 the BJP’s national leadership replaced Patel as chief minister of Gujarat with Modi on the grounds of alleged corruption and administrative failures. The following February, Gujarat was thrown into a state of unprecedented violence when communal riots broke out, leaving more than 1,000 dead. On February 27, 2002, a train carrying Hindu pilgrims was set on fire near the Godhra railway station in eastern Gujarat, killing 59 passengers. The reprisals were swift and savage: over the next few weeks Hindus and Muslims clashed in riots that were shocking in their brutality.
Modi, whose government was accused of complicity, resigned as chief minister in July. Assembly elections were held in December 2002, and the BJP won again. Modi resumed his chief ministership, in which he continued for 12 years. In 2012 a special investigation team cleared Modi in its closure report on the 2002 riots.
After the 2002 elections Shah was made a minister in the Modi government and held multiple portfolios, including the key departments of home affairs, law and justice, civil defense, and transport. He emerged as one of the most powerful leaders in Gujarat during this period and helped Modi consolidate power and diminish the authority of political rivals. Shah has been accused of sidelining police officers and government officials testifying against the Gujarat government in cases relating to the 2002 riots, and of manipulating the delimitation exercise (the process of defining the boundaries of constituencies) in a way that would favor the BJP’s prospects.
Association with sporting bodies
Modi and Shah have been instrumental in minimizing the Congress’s hold over sporting bodies, which have traditionally been under political control. In 2006 Shah was made president of the Gujarat State Chess Association. In 2009 he served as vice president of the Gujarat Cricket Association, with Modi as president; Shah ascended to the post of president in 2014 after Modi was elected prime minister of the country. In 2019 Shah’s son, Jay Shah, was elected secretary of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), prompting accusations of nepotism. Jay Shah has since been appointed president of the Asian Cricket Council and elected president of the International Cricket Council (ICC).
National politics
- 1980: Joined the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP)
- 1982: Became joint secretary of the ABVP
- 1987: Joined the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) youth wing, the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha
- 1989: Became the secretary of the BJP’s unit in Ahmedabad, Gujarat
- 1997: Won his first state assembly poll, from Sarkhej, Gujarat
- 1998: Became state secretary of the Gujarat BJP
- 1999: Became state vice president of the Gujarat BJP
- 2001: Became national coordinator of the BJP’s cooperative wing
- 2002: Became a minister in the Gujarat government under Narendra Modi
- 2013: Became national general secretary of the BJP
- 2014: Became national president of the BJP
- 2017: Won election to the Rajya Sabha
- 2019: Won election to the Lok Sabha and was made home minister
- 2021: Was given charge of the newly formed Ministry of Cooperation
Political strategist
In 2013 the BJP’s central leadership picked Modi as their candidate for prime minister in the 2014 general election. As Modi’s political locus shifted from Gujarat to New Delhi, so did Shah’s. In recognition of Shah’s proficiency in election campaign management, he was appointed general secretary of the party and given charge of poll strategy for the key state of Uttar Pradesh, which sends the highest number of elected representatives (80 seats out of 543) to the Lok Sabha, the lower house of the Indian parliament.
The BJP won the 2014 elections, with 282 seats, well past the target of 272. The victory was powered by the party’s unprecedented win in 71 of Uttar Pradesh’s 80 seats. Its successful campaign in the state was ascribed to Shah’s political acumen. Modi became the second BJP prime minister, after Atal Bihari Vajpayee, and Shah, who did not contest the polls, was elected the party’s national president, a powerful position that he held until 2020.
Home minister
In 2017 Shah was elected to the Rajya Sabha, or upper house of the Indian parliament. Two years later he fought the general election to the Lok Sabha from Gandhinagar, winning the seat. The BJP returned to power with an even larger mandate than in 2014, winning 303 seats, and Modi continued as prime minister. Shah had played an important strategic role in the BJP’s political gains in the election, including expanding the party’s previously nominal presence in such states as Odisha and Telangana. In 2019 he was made minister for home affairs in the second Modi government. Shah retained the post in Modi’s third term after the BJP won the general election of 2024, this time without an absolute majority. It won 240 seats, well below the target, but, with help from allies, it formed the government, with a total of 293 seats.
As home minister in charge of internal security, Shah oversaw two of the most important and controversial political changes made by the Modi government: the abrogation of Article 370 of the Indian constitution, and an amendment to the Citizenship Act. Both changes had been poll promises included in the BJP’s manifesto for the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
Article 370, a contentious provision in the Constitution that gave the Muslim-majority state of Jammu and Kashmir special status and a high degree of internal autonomy, was removed in 2019, soon after the BJP’s election victory. At the same time, Jammu and Kashmir was downgraded from statehood and reorganized into two union territories: Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh. The government’s stated intent in removing the deeply divisive Article 370 was to confront separatism and militancy in the troubled region. Critics, however, condemned it as an attempt to change the local demographics in favor of Hindus.
The Citizenship (Amendment) Act or CAA, passed by the parliament in 2019, granted Indian citizenship to persecuted religious minorities from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan. The eligible minorities listed were Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, Parsis, and Christians. It was the first time that religion had been used to determine citizenship of India. In parallel, a National Register of Citizens (NRC) was created, ostensibly to combat illegal immigration. As of 2024 the NRC had been implemented only in the state of Assam.
These changes received a mixed response within the country. Although the BJP’s supporters welcomed the delivery of two of the party’s key electoral promises, there was widespread censure of what were seen as strategic decisions by a pro-Hindutva government to discriminate against the country’s Muslim population, reduce its numbers, and exclude it from citizenship. Countrywide protests were organized by students, civil society, and opposition parties against the CAA and the NRC. The latter, which was particularly opposed in the northeastern states of India, was removed from the BJP’s election manifesto for 2024.
Controversies
Over the years, the Modi-Shah partnership has prevailed over opposition from within the politicians’ own party, such as from veteran BJP leader Lal Krishna Advani, who in 2014 voiced concerns about Modi’s candidature for prime minister. Shah’s ascent from working behind the scenes to being one of the country’s most visible politicians has also been opposed by factions within the BJP, primarily on the basis of controversies he had been involved in while in the Gujarat government, one of which had resulted in criminal charges against him.
Sohrabuddin Sheikh case
In 2010 Amit Shah was arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and charged with arranging the extrajudicial killings of Sohrabuddin Sheikh, his wife, Kausar Bi, and Tulsiram Prajapati. Sheikh and Prajapati had been criminal associates involved in extortion; Sheikh had also been suspected of spying. The three were allegedly killed in 2005–06 in “fake encounters” (opportunities for extrajudicial killings created by the police). Shah was given bail after three months in prison but was barred from entering Gujarat for two years. In 2012 the Supreme Court allowed him to return to Gujarat, and he won the state assembly elections that year from the Naranpura constituency. In 2014 he was cleared in the Sohrabuddin case by a special CBI court.
Illegal surveillance
In 2013 the investigative website Cobrapost published a report accusing Shah of having used state machinery while he was home minister of Gujarat in 2009 to conduct illegal surveillance of a woman resident of the state. Opposition parties demanded a probe, whereas Shah dismissed the report as political propaganda. In 2014 the woman told the Supreme Court that the surveillance had been carried out at her personal request for reasons of safety.
Personal life
Shah is a fan of cricket, India’s most popular sport, and also enjoys playing chess. He is an avid reader, with a particular interest in history, and a movie buff. In 2016 he became a trustee of the Somnath Temple, a sacred pilgrimage site in Gujarat devoted to the deity Shiva. Shah and his wife, Sonal Shah, have a son, Jay Shah, who is a businessman as well as a cricket administrator.