In a big boost for Congress ahead of the Gujarat Assembly polls due late this year, the Supreme Court stated the conviction of Hardik Patel in a 2015 rioting case. In July 2018, a sessions court in Mehsana district had sentenced the Gujarat Congress working president to two years of imprisonment for rioting and arson at Visnagar town during the Patidar quota agitation spearheaded by him in 2015. While the Gujarat High Court suspended his sentence in August 2018 itself, it refused to stay his conviction in the case.