Chandigarh: Sukhwinder Singh Sukhu-led Congress government in the hilly state of Himachal Pradesh had a sigh of relief as it won four of the six assembly byelections, which was crucial for it to secure a majority in the state assembly.
However, the party lost all four parliament seats by a big margin, showing that voters still preferred the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) over the Congress for national elections.
Months ahead of general elections, the revolt within the Congress government led to the exit and disqualification of six of its 40 MLAs, triggering clouds of worries for the Sukhu government.
The government fell below the majority mark, leaving it within striking distance of the BJP to engineer collapse.
In the byelections held along with parliamentary polls, Congress defeated four of six defectors, who fought from the BJP side, thereby cementing its position in the 68-member state assembly.
With these four wins, it enjoys the support of 38 MLAs, three more than the requisite majority mark.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and home minister Amit Shah, while campaigning in the state, had said that the Congress government in Himachal would not last long.
However, the mandate of the people did not go as the BJP planned. The BJP’s tally too has gone up to 27 following victories in two seats in the bypolls but the difference in BJP and Congress tally has widened.
The Congress can further improve its tally since bypolls are also due on three more assembly seats vacated by the resignation of three independents supporting the BJP.
As per the poll outcome, the Congress’s Ranjit Rana defeated BJP’s Rajinder Rana by a margin of 2,440 votes in Sujanpur, the home segment of Union minister Anurag Thakur.
Other candidates of the ruling party, Vivek Sharma won Kutlehar in Una, defeating Devinder Bhutto of BJP by 5,356 votes, and Rakesh Kalia defeated BJP’s Chaitanya Sharma by 8,487 votes. In both these seats, independents Rajeev Sharma and Ashok Sonkhala performed better than the BJP candidates.
The first woman candidate from Lahaul Spiti in the last five decades, Congress’s Anuradha Rana, defeated BJP rebel Ramlal Markanda by a margin of 1,960 votes and BJP’s Ravi Thakur finished third with 3049 votes.
On the contrary, BJP’s Sudhir Sharma defeated Congress’s Devinder Jaggi in Dharamshala, and Inder Dutt Lakhanpal defeated Subhash Chand in Barsar.
Modi stamp in general elections
On the contrary, the stamp of Modi’s popularity was loud and clear as it won all four parliament seats including Mandi, Hamirpur, Shimla and Kangra. In 2019 too, BJP had won all these four seats.
As per the election data, actor Kangana Ranaut of BJP won against her Congress rival Vikramaditya Singh by 74,755 votes.
Union minister of information and broadcast Anurag Thakur too was declared winner after he defeated his Congress rival Satpal Raizada by 1.82 Lakh votes.
Dr Rajeev Bhardwaj won the Kangra seat by a huge margin of over 2.51 lakh votes, the highest in the state in this election.
Meanwhile, Suresh Kumar Kashyap too won the Shimla seat by a margin of 90,000 votes.
Poll pundits suggest that, unlike Hindi belt states where the Modi factor was diluted, this worked perfectly well in Himachal.
However, voters in Himachal did not like attempts by the BJP to engineer a collapse in the popularly elected government. Hence, they made Congress candidates win so that it completes its full five-year tenure.
