Himachal: Amid rumblings in Congress over Abhishek Singhvi, BJP names candidate for lone RS seat

The Rajya Sabha election for the lone seat in Himachal Pradesh took an interesting turn Thursday with the BJP fielding a candidate, forcing a contest. A section of the Congress claimed there was a sense of resentment among some of its MLAs over the high command’s decision to field CWC member and senior lawyer Abhishek Singhvi, an outsider, as the candidate.

The opposition BJP quickly moved in fielding Harsh Mahajan, a former Congress veteran. Mahajan joined the BJP in 2022 ahead of the Assembly elections. He was then the working president of the Himachal Pradesh Congress. A former state minister, Mahajan is a three-time MLA. He is the son of former Himachal Assembly speaker and ex-Cabinet minister Des Raj Mahajan.

Sources in the Congress said the state party leadership was not in favour of fielding a candidate from outside, arguing that the state had rarely — in fact on only two occasions — had an outsider as Rajya Sabha MP. “The high command miscalculated and imposed an outsider… that is where the BJP saw the chink and opportunity. I am sure Singhvi will sail through but the party should not have fielded a person from outside the state,” a Congress leader said.

In the Assembly, the ruling Congress has 40 members while the BJP has 25. There are three independents. “We will contest the election to win and I have also filed nomination for winning the seat,” Mahajan said.

The Himachal Congress had earlier urged Sonia Gandhi to contest. While Gandhi too was an outsider, there would not have been any divergence of opinion on her candidature given her stature. Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu called Mahajan a “symbolic leader” and asserted that the Congress has the majority in the Assembly.

On the other hand, former Chief