 "<b>Newsmaker:</b> Harish Rawat")
At that time, he was minister of state in the Manmohan Singh Cabinet. But he chose not to leave the party. Instead of sulking, Rawat started building his image as an articulate leader, appearing regularly on prime-time TV news debates on various policy matters. Soon, he was heading the key water resource ministry as a full-fledged Cabinet minister.
Rawat also kept the pressure on Bahuguna, who was Uttarakhand's chief minister then. Within two years, he managed to dislodge Bahuguna and fulfilled his long-cherished dream of becoming the chief minister of the state on February 1, 2014.
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Close aides of Rawat admit that he never gives in easily and uses all political tools to marginalise his adversaries. This art, they say, he learnt from veteran Congress leader Narayan Dutt Tiwari.
In his long political journey, Rawat has seen many ups and downs in politics. When Uttarakhand was formed in 2000, the presence of Congress in the hill state was almost negligible. The Bharatiya Janata Party's lotus was in full bloom. Even in the interim assembly at that time, there were just three members of the Congress in the 23-member House with 17 belonging to the ruling BJP.
And then came Rawat. He was chosen by the Congress high command to head and revitalise the state unit. Rawat, with his intelligent organisational skills, single-handedly set about the task of reviving the party. He strengthened the organisation at the block level in such a way that the party scored a stunning victory in the assembly elections in 2002 by getting the majority on its own. The Congress's win came as a shock to BJP which had played a major role in the formation of the hill state.
But as Congress's fortunes started to soar in Uttarakhand, the party chose to ignore Rawat and brought in Tiwari, a political heavyweight, to head the first elected government of the state in 2002. This was a bitter pill that Rawat quietly swallowed despite mounting pressure from several party MLAs to defect and join hands with BJP to form a new government in the state. Rawat remained loyal to the Congress party and continued to head its state unit till 2007.
Every time he was sidelined by Tiwari and other detractors, Rawat bounced back and emerged stronger. And when he took oath as chief minister in 2014, his 12-year-long wait finally came to an end; he was the top contender for the post in 2002 and then again in 2012.
Born on 27 March 1949 in Mohanari, near Almora, Rawat has a bachelor's degree in law from Lucknow University. He began his political career from the grass-roots level as a student leader and gradually worked his way up.
In 1974, he was elected the district head of the party unit. In 1980, Rawat got the ticket to contest for the Lok Sabha seat from Almora and defeated BJP stalwart Murli Manohar Joshi. He created a hat-trick by winning the seat in the next three Lok Sabha elections till 1989. However, after the resurgence of BJP following the Ram Temple movement in 1991, Rawat's luck ran out. He faced defeat four times since 1991.
In 2002 after the he was ignored for the post of state chief minister, he was nominated to the Rajya Sabha. At the same time, he continued to be the state party chief till 2007.
Meanwhile, Rawat managed to get a ticket for his wife, Renuka, from the Almora seat in the 2004 Lok Sabha election. But Renuka lost to BJP's Bachi Singh Rawat. After Almora seat was declared reserved for SC candidates, Rawat shifted his constituency to Haridwar where he won with more than 100,000 votes in the 2009 general election.