Himachal byelections: Congress aspirants camp in Delhi for tickets as BJP rivals get early campaign advantage
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TNR Desk
With the Congress yet to decide candidates for the four Lok Sabha and the six Assembly seats where polling is to be done on June 1, the ticket aspirants have been camping in Delhi to ensure they are not edged out by their rivals in the race. The BJP, on the other hand, has already announced all the tickets, giving its candidates the advantage of starting their campaign much in advance.
A number of ticket aspirants, including some BJP dissidents, The Newz Radar spoke to were camping in Delhi. There were others who did not respond to repeated calls or had their cellphones switched off.
A crucial meeting of the Congress central election committee is to be held in Delhi on Saturday (April 13, 2024), following which the names of candidates for both Assembly byelections and the Lok Sabha elections may be announced. The meeting will be held under the chairmanship of party’s national president Mallikarjun Kharge. From Himachal, Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu, Congress state president Pratibha Singh and Deputy Chief Minister Mukesh Agnihotri will be attending the meeting.
2 candidates almost final
Sources said the names of Vivek Sharma from Kutlehar and Devender Singh Jaggi from Dharamshala appear to be almost final while there is still a dilemma regarding the Sujanpur seat. The names of two to three probable candidates from Gagret, Lahaul-Spiti and Barsar are on the panel.
The screening committee on Wednesday brainstormed the names received from the Block Congress Committees and the survey report. Party sources said that in the recent meeting of the coordination committee and screening committee held in Delhi, along with finalising the names of the Lok Sabha candidates, the candidates for the Assembly byelections were also discussed. In the meeting, the state Congress unit had decided to take names from the Block Congress Committees and get the survey done while reaching a consensus on the candidates for some seats.
Former MLA Dogra from Barsar?
Former MLA Manjit Singh Dogra is a potential candidate from Barsar Assembly constituency. The names of Gyan Chand and Sanjeev Sharma are also on the panel. From Gagret, Rakesh Kalia is the frontrunner while the names of former state president Kuldeep Kumar and Raman Jaswal are also being discussed. The names of Kangra Cooperative Bank chairman Kuldeep Pathania, Naresh Thakur and Ravindra Verma are on the panel for the Sujanpur seat.
In Lahaul-Spiti, consensus is said to be lacking on the candidature of former BJP minister Ramlal Markanda. The Block Congress Committee has opposed giving the Congress ticket to a BJP leader. Several delegations of Congress leaders from Lahaul-Spiti also met the Chief Minister recently and registered their protest. Local leaders have proposed making a leader associated with Congress a candidate. In such a situation, the names of former MLA from Lahaul-Spiti Raghuveer Singh, zilla parishad member Anuradha Rana and youth leader Dorje Larje are being discussed.
