The Congress suffered a major setback in the scrutiny of nomination papers for the Himachal Assembly polls on Tuesday as the Election Commission rejected the nomination of its veteran leader and IPH Minister, Vidya Stokes due to incomplete nomination papers.
Stokes had withdrawn herself from the Theog constituency in favour of Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh earlier, but later Singh was given ticket from Arki. Stokes decided to file her nomination on the last day of nomination, after the Congress high command did not give ticket to Vijay Khachi, recommended by her for Theog.
The AICC had declared the name of Deepak Rathore from Theog and expressing her unhappiness on Monday, Stokes had announced to file her nomination as an independent candidate. But later, she was declared the official candidate of Congress just filing her nomination.
Though the Congress had not announced about the withdrawal of official candidature from Deepak Rathore, he had also applied his nomination from Theog as authentic Congress nominee. Sources said her nomination papers were rejected on the ground that the papers had not been annexed with an AICC authority letter about her being Congress nominee.
District Electoral Officer, Rohan Chand Thakur had confirmed on Monday that two candidates, namely Vidya Stokes and Deepak Rathore had filed their nominations as Congress candidates from Theog.
The rejection of Stokes’ candidature from Theog is likely to change the political equations in the constituency as the constituency has long been represented by Stokes and she seems to be a tough challenge again.
As CPM’s former Secretary Rakesh Singha would also contest from Theog, the fight is likely to be tough one in the assembly as people will be choosing a new representative.