With Dhumal losing his seat, who will head BJP govt in HP?

Eclipsed in the high-voltage elections in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home State Gujarat was the classic paradox that was the Himachal Pradesh Assembly poll.

The BJP’s chief ministerial candidate PK Dhumal lost his own seat while steering the party to victory in the hill State.

The irony was even more pronounced because Dhumal’s chief rival, outgoing Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, as well as his son Vikramaditya Singh won their own seats despite the party having lost the election.

The BJP’s highest decision-making body was huddled till late in the evening to discuss who would replace Dhumal. the Although Union Health Minister JP Nadda’s name had done the rounds even before Dhumal’s name was formally announced for the post, there are other candidates such as Jairam Thakur whose names were said to be in the reckoning.

The BJP’s central leadership had summoned other senior leaders from the State for discussions as well, including Suresh Bharadwaj, Narendra Bragta and Rajiv Sehgal.

A two-time CM, Dhumal, who belongs to a farmer family, lost from Sujanpur to friend-turned-foe Rajinder Rana. He was shifted from his original constituency Hamirpur to adjoining Sujanpur in this election, reportedly against his wishes. Dhumal’s close aide Ravinder Kumar Ravi and his MP son Anurag Thakur’s father-in-law Gulab Singh Thakur also lost the election.

At the same time, six-time CM Virbhadra, a scion of the Rampur-Bushahr royal family, registered a win from Arki despite the Congress receiving a drubbing in the State.

The BJP had announced Dhumal’s candidature late into the campaign.

Although he was not the central leadership’s favourite for the role and Nadda was being considered an alternative, several factors influenced the party’s decision to announce his candidature. The first was Dhumal’s visibility and statewide acceptance.

In the ABP News-Lokniti-CSDS survey, Dhumal emerged as the most preferred for CM followed by Virbhadra. The second was the obvious domination of Rajputs in HP politics. Of the 68.57 lakh population, about 25.22 per cent are SCs, 5.71 per cent are STs and 13.52 per cent are OBCs. Among the 50.72 per cent general population, Rajputs constitute about 33 per cent while Brahmins are about 18 per cent.

From the time HP was carved out of Punjab in 1971, and even before that, the undisputed leader of the State was Yashwant Singh Parmar, a Rajput from Baghthan, Sirmaur district.

He was followed by Thakur Ram Lal, also of the Congress, and Prem Kumar Dhumal, a Thakur from the BJP. Shanta Kumar was the sole Brahmin to have been elected CM twice, once in 1977-1980 and then in 1990-1992.

Besides the caste calculus, Dhumal also has a better hold over the BJP’s organisational network and popular appeal, having been CM before. To counter Virbhadra, the BJP needed him in Himachal.

But while he campaigned across the State and steered the BJP towards a clear victory, he himself lost, leaving the BJP struggling to find a suitable candidate for the top job.