Shimla: Himachal Pradesh Congress is facing a tough situation before the assembly poll as five times Chief Minister of the state Virbhadra Singh has threaten to resign form the poll campaign committee. He is miffed over party high command’s decision to ignore him in the screening committees.
Delhi Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit was appointed to head the committee and Minister of State for Home Jitendra Singh, AICC General Secretary Birendra Singh, PCC chief Kaul Singh Thakur and CLP leader Vidya Stokes are appointed its members.
Virbhadra Singh is considered as only mass leader in Himachal Pradesh and the party can’t afford to ignore him if the party wants to regain power from BJP in state. If we believe rumor, he had even threaten to left party, which he has served from last fifty years. However, with the intervention of some senior congress leaders, Singh is persuaded to avoid taking any such extreme step.
Virbhadra Singh is the most acceptable face of the Congress party in the state and in every possible event, he has proved his popularity to the party high command and his distracters as well. If in the assembly election, Singh switches his loyalty to some other party or floated a new political outfit, it will directly hurt Congress’s chances in state.
It is not the first time when a section of the Congress party has tried to downplay his importance in state politics. In Rohru By-election his choice was overruled and Congress lost first time to BJP in Rohru and later his son Vikramaditya Singh youth Congress election was cancelled, in which he was elected with the unprecedented margin. However this time Virbhadra Singh seems not to give up for his distracters and looking to fight it out. Though report suggests that Congress have not accepted his demand to project him Chief Minister Candidate before poll and any clear number of candidates of his choice, but congress strategy makers and negotiators will have tough time to placate him without giving him lion share in state politics.
