Shimla, May 1 Seeking votes with folded hands can be tough for Congress veteran and four-time Rajya Sabha MP Anand Sharma in his new battleground Kangra, the largest Lok Sabha constituency in Himachal Pradesh in terms of voters which plays a crucial role in state politics.
The ruling Congress in the state has pitted former Union Minister Sharma, known to be a 'mentor' to Chief Minister Sukhvinder Sukhu, against Rajiv Bhardwaj of the BJP, which ignored the sitting MP, Kishan Kapoor.
For Sharma, who belongs to Shimla, this would be his first electoral battle for the Lok Sabha. With a political career spanning over four decades, Sharma, who first entered the Rajya Sabha in 1984, is a surprise pick by the party.
The reason: The constituency with 17 Assembly seats in Kangra and some parts of Chamba district with a base of 12.58 lakh voters, the highest in the state, has a large number of ex-servicemen and a big chunk of Brahmin voters, a community to which both the candidates belong.
Kangra, an erstwhile princely state once ruled by Katoch ruler Sansar Chand, has never repeated a sitting MP in the past five decades with four-time MP Shanta Kumar being the only exception. Kumar was elected for two consecutive terms in 1998 and 1999. He also served as a Union Minister and a Chief Minister for two terms, from 1977-80 and 1991-92.
Sharma, a founder member of the party’s student wing, the National Students Union of India (NSUI), had unsuccessfully contested the Assembly elections from Shimla in 1982, losing to Daulat Ram Chauhan of the BJP by a margin of 2,945 votes.
Poll analysts say the Kangra parliamentary constituency, which has around 20 per cent Brahmin voters and 7 per cent OBC electorate, has always been an interesting battleground. In Assembly elections, Kangra district holds the key in deciding the fate of the state’s two archrivals -- the Congress and the BJP.
“It’s a survival battle for Anand Sharma this time. Recently, he was sulking over the party leadership's decision to field Congress stalwart Abhishek Manu Singhvi for the lone Rajya Sabha seat in Himachal,” a senior Congress leader told IANS.
“Now they want Sharma to prove his mettle in his home state that he represented for over four decades,” he said, adding, “Even the Chief Minister, who is known for his proximity with Sharma, has to prove his popularity as in the Kangra seat, the party has the maximum number of legislators."
In the Assembly elections held in December 2022, the Congress won 12 out of the 17 seats in the district.
In 2022, Sharma, known to be a prominent G23 leader, resigned as the Chairman of the Congress’ Steering Committee for the Himachal Assembly elections, alleging “continuing exclusions and insults”.
In Himachal politics, Sharma was always the target of six-time Chief Minister late Virbhadra Singh when it came to garnering votes for the Congress party as they belonged to differing camps.
While Virbhadra Singh had no qualms about folding his hands and bowing his head before the people to seek votes for the party, Sharma believed “it’s too lousy a job for a central minister”.
Virbhadra Singh, who was the Union Minister for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, was often quoted as saying: “I am a senior minister. My rank in the cabinet is seventh. I have no ego at all. I am a (party) worker first, then an MP, and then a minister”, in an apparent jibe at Sharma.
Contrary to Virbhadra Singh, who had entered the Lok Sabha in 1962, Sharma, who questioned the party’s aggressive campaign pitch for holding a caste census, was often quoted as saying, “It does not behove a Union Minister to campaign during the elections”.
The four Lok Sabha seats in Himachal will go to the polls in the seventh and final phase on June 1.
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