Polls on mind, Congress takes in Jammu leader who led public defence of Kathua accused

But in the wake of the Kathua case row, Singh had left the BJP in 2019, and gone on to set up a ‘Dogra Swabhiman Sangathan’, invoking Dogra pride.

Recently, Singh was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate on charges of money laundering, and is currently out on bail. Separately, he is facing a CBI probe over land owned by his family-run R B Educational Trust.

Sources said that Lal Singh spent several days in Delhi to pursue his case with the Congress, with the party divided over taking him back in view of the controversies surrounding him. Within the Jammu Congress many were apprehensive he might do more damage because of the cloud over him.

But the Congress high command appears to have finally decided in favour of Singh, as he is seen by many as a strong candidate from Udhampur. The BJP had won both the Lok Sabha seats falling in the Jammu province in 2019, and is starting out this time riding the support for it in the region over the abrogation of Article 370 and the consecration of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya.

A senior Congress leader pointed to Singh’s string of victories, both in the Lok Sabha and Assembly, contesting on tickets of different parties over the last three decades, to underline his significance.

However, in 2019, the Lok Sabha election held in the wake of the Kathua controversy, Singh had lost his deposit from both the Jammu and Udhampur seats he contested from.

In 2014, after he won from the Basohli seat in the Assembly elections, Singh was made a minister in the PDP-BJP government.

But his tenure was marked by controversies, with Singh accused of highhandedness as Health and Medical Education Minister; and as Forest Minister, of making intemperate remarks to a delegation of Gujjars and Bakerwals, reminding them of the killing of minorities in Jammu during Partition.

Then came the rape and murder of a Bakerwal girl in 2018 in Kathua. BJP leaders, including Singh, gave it a communal colour over the fact that the accused youths were Hindus and the victim a Muslim. The outcry over the public defence of the accused by Singh and another minister, Chander Prakash Ganga, put Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti under extreme pressure, finally forcing the BJP to seek their resignation.

After that, while Ganga maintained silence over the issue, Singh continued defending the accused, and was part of a series of rallies across the Jammu division seeking a CBI inquiry into the assault, suggesting bias on the part of the state police.

A court in Punjab later held six of the seven Kathua case accused as guilty and awarded them life sentences. The eighth, who had taken the plea that he was a juvenile, is also being tried as an adult now.

After the BJP distanced itself from the position taken by Singh and other leaders on the Kathua issue, Singh left the party and floated the Dogra Swabhiman Sangathan. The party appealed to Dogra pride, promising a separate Jammu state on account of its differences from Kashmir in terms of tradition, language and culture.

But lately, the Congress, which is struggling to gain momentum against the BJP, has been inching closer to Singh.

Last year, the party invited Singh for Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra as it entered Lakhanpur. Soon after, Congress spokesperson Deepika Pushkar Nath, who had represented the family of the Kathua murder-gangrape victim, resigned, questioning the party’s invite to a leader who had tried to “sabotage the legal case”.

Eventually, Singh, who attended the Lakhanpur rally, was not allowed by the Congress to share the dais with Rahul.