In an unprecedented, landmark and historic victory in the general elections 2014, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Himachal Pradesh swept the polls and won all the four Parliamentary seats.
The biggest surprise in the Himachal Pradesh election battle 2014 was the victory of the little known candidate, Ram Swarup Sharma, an unassuming BJP worker with RSS background, in Mandi Parliamentary seat. He defeated sitting MP Pratibha Singh, wife of Chief Minster Virbhadra Singh, by a margin of over 37,000 votes proving the predictions of the soothsayers wrong.
None had predicted (except The Pioneer) that BJP would win Mandi seat from the high profile wife of the Chief Minister, who had recently won the seat in a by-election in 2013, by a big margin of 1,36,000, votes . The power of the people forced Congress leaders Virbhadra Singh and his wife to lick the dust in these elections. They had, in the past, taking them for granted.
Sharma had told The Pioneer about a week back that the fight was between Diya and Tufan. (flickering candle and storm). He was also working day and night.However, the credit of his victory goes to Narendra Modi wave sweeping across the country, including Himachal Pradesh. During a visit to some villages in the outskirts of Mandi, the mediapersons were told by villagers mostly exuberant youths that they would cast votes to Modi. Many of them did not even know who was Ram Swarup Sharma.
Ironically, Virbhadra Singh and his Cabinet colleagues had all along been rejecting the existence of any Modi wave. Chief Minister, when told by a reporter that BJP was claiming to win all the four seats, retorted in anger, “I would resign in that case.” Reminding him of his words, former Minister Jai Ram Thakur, who spearheaded the BJP campaign, on Friday, said Virbhadra Singh should stick to his works and resign forthwith.
One of the reasons of BJP defeat was the bullish enmity of Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh against his detractors including Dhumal and his sons by exhausting his precious time and energy in witch-hunting and framing them in alleged false cases. It was natural for Dhumal to be bitter against Virbhadra Sigh, but hid friends advised him to demonstrate magnanimity leaving the law to take its own course.