In Himachal, BJP faces turbulent task as three dissidents decide to contest bypolls

Kalia joined the Congress in the presence of the party in charge Rajeev Shukla in Delhi on Wednesday and is hopeful to get a party ticket. There is a strong possibility that Markanda would also join the Congress, sources said. Kalia, who is still in Delhi, on Thursday openly challenged the candidature of Congress turncoat Chaitanya Sharma from the Gagret Assembly seat.

Hitting out at the Congress turncoats MLAs who joined the BJP, Kalia said, “These six leaders have no ideology. When I was with the Congress before joining the BJP, my supporters and I had cautioned the Congress central leadership not to trust them, especially Chaitanya Sharma. And today I will say these six leaders will not be honest towards the BJP which embraced them warmly. The people of Himachal are annoyed by the six turncoats who destabilised an elected government. They don’t like such cheap tactics.”

Talking to The Indian Express over the phone, Kalia said, “I have been associated with the Congress for a long time. I joined the BJP in 2022, but ideologically I am a Congress man. I have assured my supporters that we have to work together to win the four Lok Sabha seats and the bypolls on the six Assembly seats.”

Asked whether the Congress approached you or you approached it, Kalia said, “For the past few days, I have been sending emails to senior Congress leaders such as Rahul Gandhi, Mallikarjun Kharge and others. I believe they collectively decided to induct me into the party. I then conveyed to CM Sukhvidner Singh Sukhu and Himachal Pradesh Congress Committee (HPCC) chief Pratibha Singh about again joining the Congress.”

Rakesh Kalia won the Gagret seat on a Congress ticket in 2012. In 2017, he again contested from Gagret on a Congress ticket but lost. In 2022 when the Congress denied him a ticket, Kalia joined the BJP. He is a vocal critic of Chaitanya Sharma, who won the Gagret seat on a Congress ticket in 2022, and his father.

Dr Ramlal Markanda defeated then Congress candidate Ravi Thakur from Lahaul and Spiti in 2017. In 2022, Markanda lost to Thakur. Capt Ranjeet Singh contested the 2022 Assembly elections as a BJP candidate and secured 13,000 votes, but lost to Congress’s Rajinder Rana, who is now a BJP candidate.

The Congress central leadership in Delhi is likely to announce the names of its candidates for the six Assembly seats and two Lok Sabha seats on Friday.

A Congress leader said, “When BJP leaders revolted, the state Congress leadership decided that no BJP dissident would be inducted into the party. But amid changing circumstances, Kalia was inducted into the party. Other BJP dissidents are also likely to be inducted.”

According to information, Kalia, Markanda, Capt Ranjeet, former MLA from Nalagarh Lakhwinder Rana, Kangra BJP MP Kishan Kapoor, who was not given a ticket for the Lok Sabha elections, and many others had opened a front against the BJP last month.

State BJP chief Dr Rajeev Bindal did his best to pacify the dissidents, but some of them refused to budge. “Whether the Congress gives these dissidents tickets or not, we are concerned about the damage they can inflict in the bypolls and the Lok Sabha elections,” a BJP leader said.

The state BJP leadership, meanwhile, managed to pacify many dissidents by giving them lucrative ‘posts’. Lakhwinder Rana was appointed as the party’s state spokesperson. MP Kishan Kapoor’s son Sashwat Kapoor was appointed as the vice-president of the party’s youth wing Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM).

Former chief minister Prem Kumar Dhumal said on Tuesday that the BJP state leadership was making efforts to mollify party leaders who are disgruntled over the distribution of tickets to six Congress rebels, “They (disgruntled leaders) will fall in line as the BJP is a cadre-based party,” he added.