Former Mayor Devinder Jaggi frontrunner for Congress ticket from Dharamshala
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TNR Desk
Former Mayor Devinder Singh Jaggi is said to be the frontrunner for the Congress ticket from Dharamshala for the June 1 byelection even as the BJP has fielded former MLA Sudhir Sharma.
Jaggi is now a sitting councillor in the Dharamshala Municipal Corporation. He is also the general secretary of the Himachal Pradesh Congress Committee.
The byelection has been necessitated following the disqualification of Sudhir from the Vidhan Sabha for allegedly violating a whip issued by the ruling Congress for voting during the recent budget session.
Sudhir and Jaggi were friends earlier and the former Mayor is said to have played a significant role in the former MLA’s election from Dharamshala in 2012. The favour was reciprocated when Jaggi was elected the Mayor. However, both fell apart towards the 2017 Assembly election, which Sudhir lost to BJP’s Kishan Kapoor.
A case under the Prevention of Corruption Act was lodged against Jaggi in January 2022 for alleged irregularities during his mayorship when the BJP was in power in Himachal. The case had brought to the fore intense infighting in the Dharamshala Congress unit as Jaggi had blamed a “party leader and his friends for the case against him”. He had alleged that he was targeted by the Congress’ ‘B team’, which was working in league with the BJP. He said he had put up posters and banners on the New Year in Dharamshala, which were perceived by his detractors as his staking of claim for the 2022 Assembly poll ticket.
In the elections for the Dharamsala Municipal Corporation in 2021, the Congress won only five of the 17 wards. This time, Jaggi and his supporters won whereas most candidates of the Sudhir camp lost. Sudhir had accused Jaggi of opposing him in the 2022 elections whereas the former Mayor accused the ex-MLA of getting his and three other councillors houses attacked with stones after winning the elections.
