Congress To Lose Himachal After Lok Sabha Polls? Trouble Mounts For Sukhu Government

Himachal Pradesh is one of the three states and the only northern state being ruled by Congress. However, all is not going well for the ruling party after recent turmoil witnessed during the Rajya Sabha elections where it lost despite having a majority. Now, trouble is mounting further for the Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu-led Congress government in the state. On Saturday, in a fresh setback for the party, six-party rebel MLAs who were disqualified and three independent MLAs joined the Bharatiya Janata Party. The rebel MLAs were disqualified after they voted for the BJP candidate during the Rajya Sabha polls leading to Harsh Mahajan's surprise win and loss of Congress candidate Abhishek Manu Singhvi.

The six former Congress MLAs, who joined the BJP are Rajinder Rana (Sujanpur), Sudhir Sharma (Dharamshala), Inder Dutt Lakhanpal (Barsar), Ravi Thakur (Lahaul-Spiti), Chaitanya Sharma (Gagret) and Davinder Kumar Bhutto (Kutlehar) and the independent MLAs are Ashish Sharma (Hamirpur), Hoshiyar Singh (Dehra), and KL Thakur (Nalagarh).

Majority Mark In Himachal

In the 2022 assembly polls, the BJP had failed to retain power by getting just only 25 seats in the 68-member assembly. The Congress had secured a decisive majority by winning 40 seats while the majority mark was 35. However, after six MLAs were disqualified, the majority mark came down to 32 with the house having 62 members. Therefore, the Congress has still two more MLAs than the majority mark.

Boost For the BJP

With three independent MLAs joining the BJP, the saffron party's tally jumped to 28. Since the Elections Commission of India has announced the bypolls for the six vacant seats as well along with the Lok Sabha polls, the BJP is likely to field the rebel leaders once again on its ticket. The polling will be held on June 1 and the counting of votes will take place on June 4. If the BJP wins all the six seats, then its tally will reach 34 in the house, equal to that of Congress. Thus, the Sukhu government may find it difficult to survive a floor test.

Blame-Game In Himachal

BJP leader and former Chief Minister Jairam Thakur alleged that the Congress does not have the majority in the state. Welcoming the former MLAs into the BJP fold, Union Minister Anurag Thakur said that number nine represents completeness, balance and perfection. On the other hand, Himachal Congress leaders accused the BJP of trying to topple the party's government and said it would last full five years.