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general elections

Its end of draght for Dhumal family

With Anurag Thakur becoming a
minister in the Modi government,
the 15 month draught for Dhumal
family has finally ended. His father
Prem Kumar Dhumal, a two time
chief minister of the state, was de-
clared CM candidate by the BJP in
December 2017 assembly elections,
however he lost the election by a
thin margin. Now the baton has
been passed to the younger gen-
eration and Anurag have become
minister at the centre. On the po-
litical front this has ofcourse given
strength to Dhumal also, who didn’t
left any stone unturned during the
election campaign to work for the
BJP candidates, specially his son
Anurag Thakur. Dhumal already
holds enough clout in the state BJP
workers. The BJP chief Amit Shah
had promised people of the Hamir-
pur during election campaign that
if you ensure thumping majority
win for Anurag, he will be given a
big Post. People of the constituency
voted for Anurag with open heart
and now Shah have also fulfilled his
promice. This is very intersting to
note a fact that when Dhumal first
hill people gave 33,000 votes for NoTa time had become chief minister of
Himachal Pradesh in 1998, it was
Narender Modi, the then state BJP
Himachal Pradesh is a state where two party system is strong for the last incharge, who ensured that Dhumal
few decades. No other party could find space in between Congress and the becomes the CM.
BJP. Though CPI (M) has succeeded in getting few votes in the state on certain
seats and a CPM candidate Rakesh Singha won the assembly election in 2017,
no strong third front could come in the fore after Sukh Ram’s Himachal Vi-
kas Party (HVC) which won fove seats in 1998 assembly elections and played Sharma, considered to be close to Rahul
a decesive role in the formations of Dhumal government. However, in 2019 Gandhi, who had lost assembly election
elections a new trend is seen in the Himachal voters. As many as 33,008 peo- in 2017 to Kishan Kapoor.
ple pushed the NOTA button in the elections which is the highest ever in Jai Ram wears a image of a clean
the history of this hilly state. Anf this too when there was a pro-Modi wave leader, however many feel that he
working on the ground. The Kangra seat received highest number of NOTA have to work better on government
votes with a figure of 11,327 votes while Shimla received 8357, Hamirpur 8026 front. Senior leaders in the BJP feel that
and Mandi minimum of 5298 votes. Former Director of Information and Jai Ram need to tight the noose of the
political analyst BD Sharma says that this number is surprising. ‘’We have to beaurocracy so that the projects are
address these people also. May be this number increase in future. Political completed on time and people could
parties have to find out why such huge number didn’t showed interest to get the benefit of it.
vote them,’’ he added
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