The Chhattisgarh High Court’s order on Thursday, convicting Amit Jogi in the murder of Ram Avtar Jaggi 23 years ago, has brought focus back on what has been called the first political murder in Chhattisgarh after the formation of the state in 2000.

Jaggi, the treasurer of the NCP – which was headed at the time by former Chhattisgarh chief minister Ajit Jogi’s rival and ex-Congress leader Vidya Charan Shukla – was shot on June 4, 2003, in the state capital Raipur. Amit Jogi, Ajit’s son, was tried on conspiracy charges in connection with the case, but was acquitted in 2007, though 28 others were convicted.

Jaggi’s son, Satish, said the High Court’s decision to overturn Amit’s acquittal came as a “true tribute” to his father.

“I was unhappy with the investigations carried out by the local police, as they were not catching the real culprits. When the BJP came to power, I wrote to the new chief minister, Raman Singh, asking for a CBI probe, and Singh handed over the case to the CBI. We welcome the decision of the HC, and it’s a true tribute to my father,” Satish, a 50-year-old businessman, told The Indian Express. After his father’s murder, Satish joined the NCP and later switched to the Congress. However, he says he is no longer an active member.

Ram Avtar Jaggi was also once in the Congress, where he was a staunch supporter of veteran Congress leader Vidya Charan Shukla. After the state of Chhattisgarh was carved out of Madhya Pradesh in 2000, the ruling Congress party in Madhya Pradesh chose Ajit Jogi as the chief minister of Chhattisgarh over Shukla, which had created a cold war between Shukla and Jogi within the party.

In election year 2003, Shukla quit the Congress party and joined the NCP, after which Jaggi followed in his footsteps.

Jaggi had been in the process of organising a massive political rally for the NCP to be attended by Sharad Pawar and was returning from a meeting held to discuss details of the rally when a single bullet was fired at him, killing him near Jaistamb Chowk on June 4, 2003.

After the case went to the CBI, the agency arrested 29 individuals, including Amit Jogi (48). Amit is a former Congress MLA who holds an MA from JNU in Delhi and an LLB from Pt. Ravishankar Shukla University in Raipur.

In 2013, Amit won his Assembly seat on a Congress ticket from Marwahi, his family’s bastion. In January 2016, after a fallout with the Congress, Amit Jogi was suspended from the party for six years. Following this, in June 2016, Amit’s father, Ajit Jogi, resigned from the party.

Ajit Jogi then floated his own party, named Janata Congress Chhattisgarh Jogi (JCC J), which in coalition with the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) won seven seats in the 2018 Assembly polls.

In the 2018 polls, Ajit Jogi contested in place of Amit Jogi and won the Marwahi seat. After Ajit Jogi’s death in May 2020, Amit tried to contest the bypoll in November 2020, but his nomination was cancelled after his caste certificate was pronounced invalid by a committee.

After Ajit’s death, Amit led the party, but the party saw desertions and lost steam. It failed to win a single seat in the 2023 polls. Currently, Amit Jogi has been trying to revive the party and take on the ruling BJP in the state on several issues, including the latest Bill cracking down on religious conversion passed in the Assembly last month.

Amit’s political career has seen multiple controversies. In 2019, he was arrested for allegedly producing fake birth certificates during the 2013 election. In 2003, a CBI court in Delhi acquitted Amit, along with others who were accused of playing a role in conducting a sting operation on then Union forest minister Dilip Singh Judeo. The sting had purportedly shown Judeo allegedly accepting Rs 9 lakh in a hotel room in New Delhi.

Amit Jogi’s mother, Renu Jogi, is a doctor and a former MLA. Amit’s wife, Richa, too has contested Assembly elections in the past, but lost.