Know Madhusudan Mistry, the man who will take on Modi in Vadodara

New Delhi, Jun 21: The Congress party has anounced that Madhusudan Mistry will challenge Narendra Modi from Vadodara Lok Sabha constituency.In electoral politics, there are leaders who lead electoral battles from the front and common people know them, recognize them. But the backroom guys are the ones who formulate strategies and manage the entire campaign of political parties at the micro-level.Some of these backroom guys are also renowned leaders but most of them always prefer to act from behind the curtain. They toil hard, day in and day out, in ensuring the successful execution of booth level strategies. Madhusudan Mistry is one of those backroom leaders who have earned a name for winning electoral battles from behind the curtain. It was Mistry's astute poll management skills that helped Congress successfully translate widespread anger against BJP government in Karnataka into votes for Congress party. Before Karnataka, Mistry had ensured spectacular victory for Congress party in Kerala assembly elections. So who is this Madhusudan Mistry? Madhusudan Mistry is a Congress leader from Gujarat. Though he is originally an RSS man, today he has got the eyes and ears of Rahul Gandhi. He was an acolyte of Shankarsinh Vaghela when he was in BJP and had RSS leanings. He left BJP in 1995 when Vaghela revolted and formed his own Rashtriya Janata Party (RJP). Mistry joined RJP that merged with Congress later on. With the merger of RJP with Congress, Madhusudan Mistry became a Congressman and then his metamorphosis began. Mistry first entered Lok Sabha in 2001 when he contested 2001 by-election to Sabarkantha Lok Sabha seat and defeated BJP candidate Upendra Trivedi by over 20,000 votes. Madhusudan once again won the seat in 2004 Lok Sabha elections. In 2009, he lost the seat to the BJP candidate. After Congres party's successive victories in Kerala and Karnataka assembly elections, Mistry's political graph underwent a steep rise and as a recognition of his poll management skills, Rahul Gandhi recently gave him charge of Uttar Pradesh, the most crucial state in Lok Sabha elections, replacing stalwart Digvijay Singh. Mistry's appointment becomes significant in view of the fact that BJP has also entrusted a Gujarati leader, Amit Shah, with the task of formulating and executing electoral strategies for the state. In a sense, two Gujarati politicians will formulate and execute electoral strategies for Congress and BJP in Uttar Pradesh. UP is crucial for both Congress and BJP as both parties have been outmaneuvered by SP and BSP and the two national parties are scrambling for third position. Narendra Modi knows it very well that he can't catapult BJP into power at the Centre unless the party does exceedingly well in UP ( it has 80 Lok Sabha seats). He has therefore entrusted his Man Friday Amit Shah with the crucial task of turning the party's fortunes in UP. Similarly, Rahul Gandhi also knows that if the Congress has to make a hat-trick at the Centre then the party's performance in UP will be crucial. That's why he has played his best card and has reposed faith in the managerial skils of Madhusudan Mistry.