In the past 27 years that the Congress has held sway in Himachal Pradesh, former chief minister and now Union Minister for Steel Virbhadra Singh has been among the party’s tallest leaders. Now, he finds himself being cut to size in his pocket borough.

As Rohru, the Assembly constituency he represented all these years, goes to polls on November 7 following the vacancy created upon his election to the Lok Sabha this year, he is battling for his prestige.

With Virbhadra’s detractors within the party gunning for his head, a hard-hitting blow was dealt to him when AICC general secretary Rahul Gandhi travelled to Shimla and spoke about discouraging “kith and kin” politics in the party. A few days later, the Congress denied a ticket to his wife Pratibha Singh and chose to field block samiti chairman Manjit Thakur from the seat, thereby putting paid to Virbhadra’s plan to ensure the entry of his wife, a former Congress MP, to the Assembly.

His detractors did their bit in scuttling Pratibha Singh’s chances of getting a ticket, knowing that with her in, Virbhadra would continue to enjoy clout in the Congress Legislature Party.

The blow comes at a time when Virbhadra and his wife are fighting a corruption case lodged by the Prem Kumar Dhumal government, and fighting off strong rivals within the party. With the BJP on the ascent in the state — even winning the Shimla Lok Sabha seat for the first time early this year — Dhumal is convinced his party is placed quite comfortably in Rohru. “The seat is set to create history... Virbhadra’s charisma is not going to work,” he says.

... contd.