Despite having five lok Sabha seats in the State, four ex-chief ministers’ prestige is at stake in the State because BJP has fielded three ex-CMs, including Bhagat Singh Koshiyari, Maj Gen (retd) Bhuwan Chandra Khanduri and Dr Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank, while Congress has fielded Saket Bahuguna, son of ex-CM Vijay Bahuguna and Renuka Rawat, wife of incumbent State Chief Minister Harish Rawat. By placing senior most leaders in the fray, both BJP and ruling Congress party don’t want to give walkover to each other.
In this perspective ex-CM Dr Nishank and Renuka Rawat have locked their horn in Haridwar lok Sabha seat because earlier is sitting MlA and contesting to project himself as leader of Haridwar and latter is wife of sitting MP and incumbent CM Harish Rawat, who had won the seat by defeating BJP candidate by around 1.27 lakh votes during general election-2009. In another word, it can be said that it is direct fight between ex-CM and incumbent CM because CM Rawat knows that if his wife Renuka loses, then opposition within the party, who are desperate to malign his image before the Congress high command, would get active and he may lose before becoming member of Uttarakhand Vidhan Sabha.
Talking to The Pioneer, political analysts said that as BJP has fielded three ex-CMs and if party-led Government is formed at the Centre, only one would be inducted into Cabinet; so everybody is fighting to increase their victory margin. Similarly, in Congress, ex-CM Vijay Bahuguna’s and incumbent CM Harish Rawat’s prestige is at stake. If both win, then factionalism within Congress would continue and if one wins then loser will have to surrender before other.
Dr Nishank, who shifted to plain seat from hills after delimitation 2008 and won Doiwala Assembly seat by defeating congress candidate Heera Singh Bisht around 1300 votes during assembly election-2012, wants to establish himself as Angad of Ramayana. By winning the seat he wants to get rid off so called stains like Kumbha Mela-2010 scam, which is being publicised by the congress during general
election campaign.
Ex-CM Bhagat Singh Koshiyari, who is currently sitting Rajya Sabha MP and his term is going to end by this year, is contesting election from Nainital-Udhamsinghnagar against congress candidate
KC Singh Baba.
Ex-CM Maj Gen Bhuwan Chandra Khanduri, who is contesting election from Garhwal lok Sabha seat against cabinet minister Harak Singh Rawat, has been taking calculative measure during campaign. During Assembly election-2012, Gen Khanduri had lost the Kotdwar assembly seat with congress candidate Surendra Singh Negi. With this defeat, BJP got 31 seat and congress won 32 seat out of 70 members Uttarakhand Assembly. By winning this election he wants to wipe off the stains, which he got after defeat with congress during assembly election-2012.
Saket Bahuguna, who had lost Tehri lok Sabha by poll-2012 to BJP candidate Mala Rajya lakshmi Shah by more than 20,000 votes despite being a son of incumbent Uttarakhand chief minister Vijay Bahuguna, is contesting the election to regain his lost glory. Since his defeat in Tehri by poll-2012, his father and the then CM Bahuguna’s position got weakened and ultimately he had to resign from chief minister post amid pressure within the party on February 1, 2014.