Surprise to all, BJP has won all four Lok Sabha seats in Himachal Pradesh. BJP veteran Shanta Kumar has won Kangra Parliamentary constituency with overwhelming 1,70,072 votes followed by Anurag Thakur from Hamirpur with 98403 votes.
Shanta Kumar got 456163 votes while Congress candidate Chander Kumar got 286091 votes. From Hamirpur Parliamentary Constituency, Anurag Thakur managed 448035 votes while Congress nominee Rana got 349632 votes.
Virender Kashyap also succeeded to retain Shimla parliamentary seat with 84,187 margin (Virender Kashyap 385973 votes – Mohan Lal Brakta 301786 votes), whereas Ram Swaroop Sharma has trounced Congress heavyweight Pratibha Singh, wife of Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, with margin of 39,856 votes. Ram Swaroop Sharma got 362824 votes and Pratibha Singh could secure 322968 votes. In the 2013 by-election Pratibha Singh had won from Mandi Lok Sabha seat by a margin of over 1.36 lakh votes.
All four BJP candidates maintain lead from the start of the counting and dashed all hopes of Congress leaders to uphold its good show of assembly election.
BJP has secured over 53 percent vote share in the election, whereas ruling Congress party candidates could secure 40 percent of votes. CPM, SP, BSP and independent candidate accumulatively get about 3 percent of votes.
Aam Admi Party has also failed to put its mark in this election in Himachal Pradesh as it could secure little over 2 percent of votes, more than CPM, SP and BSP, in the state. Dr Rajan Sushant, sitting MP of Kangra and AAP candidate from the same segment failed to get electorates nod this time as he could not even get 25,000 votes.
To decide the fate of 38 candidates contesting from Himachal Pradesh’s four Lok Sabha seats, the counting of votes begins in the morning, for which election department has made all necessary arrangements.
Elaborate security arrangements have been made at the 16 counting centres – one each in all 12 district headquarters and four additional centres at Rampur, Palampur, Nurpur and Paonta Sahib.
