HP poll’s narrow margin in loss & victory giving sleepless nights to many candidate

Himachal Pradesh poll is giving sleepless nights to candidate as waifer thin margin remained between victory and loss of many candidate including stalwarts are in affix on this paradoxical situation. Voting has been held for 68 seats of the Himachal Legislative Assembly and counting of votes and the results are to be declared on December 8. This time also, like the 2017 elections, it is being estimated that the difference between victory and defeat in 20 to 25 seats will be less than two thousand votes. If one goes through the previous results of Election from 2003 to 2017 very few electoral victory attributed to sizeable share of mandates. In 2017, there were 18 such faces who reached the Himachal assembly after winning with two thousand or less votes. These included Congress stalwart Ramlal Thakur to Asha Kumari. Not only this, Congress MLA from Kinnaur Jagat Singh Negi won by just 120 votes while Rajeev Saizal, a minister in the Jairam government, won by 442 votes. This time also the situation is no different. In 2022 due to number of the rebels, the difference in the triangular contest seems to be very high and difference of victory and loss very narrow. In such a situation, there is a lot of confusion about which way the dolly will swing to power this time as compared to the previous elections. if the BJP manages to stop the anti-incumbency trend with the help of new faces to retain power, this trend may be loss ful proposition to BJP. It had contested on the face of Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal in 2017 assembly elections. As the leader of the opposition, Dhumal had forced the Congress to chew iron gram for five years. It benefited BJP & got 44 seats. Not only this, the margin of victory of BJP candidates in eighteen seats was less than two thousand votes. Otherwise the figure would have gone beyond fifty. Last time also there was a lot of infighting in the BJP. Due to this infighting, having 44 seats in the account Dhumal and other big stalwarts of his camp had lost the elections. Congress veterans like Asha Kumari and Ramlal Thakur, who were among the contenders for the post of Chief Minister from the Congress party, won the 2017 elections by a very narrow margin. Asha Kumari won by a total of 556 votes while Ramlal Thakur won by 1042 votes only. Apart from this, from Sujanpur, Rajendra Rana defeated Prem Kumar Dhumal, the declared face of BJP’s chief ministerial post, by 1919 votes. This was a big change. Congress’s Indra Dutt Lakhanpal won by 439 votes in Dhumal’s Hamirpur district, defeating Dhumal’s close aide Baldev Sharma. This time BJP has given ticket to Baldev Sharma’s wife Maya Sharma. Congress candidate Jagat Singh Negi won from Kinnaur with the smallest margin in these elections. He won by just 120 votes. He got 20021 votes while BJP’s Tejwant Singh Negi got 19909 votes. This time BJP did not give ticket to Tejwant Singh Negi and he is contesting as an independent candidate. Not only this, Congress candidate Dhaniram Shandil from Solan also won from his son-in-law Rajesh Kashyap by a total of 671 votes. While Lakhwinder Singh Rana won from Nalagarh by 1241 votes, this time he left Congress and joined BJP. From Kullu, Sunder Singh Thakur defeated BJP’s Maheshwar Singh by 1538 votes. While Sujan Singh Pathania from Fatehpur won his seat by 1284 votes.Leders like Bikram Singh Thakur and Rajiv Saizal, who were ministers in the Jairam government, narrowly escaped defeat in these elections. Rajiv Saizal won by just 442 votes. He won in 2012 by just 24 votes. Similarly, Bikram Singh Thakur also managed to get his seat by 1862 votes in a tough fight. Pawan Nair and Rita Dhiman were also able to get their seats with a difference of less than two thousand votes. Arun Kumar from Nagrota won by only one thousand votes. He defeated Congress veteran GS Bali. Minister Suresh Bhardaj from Shimla was able to get his seat by 1903 votes and Jubbal Kotkhai by Narendra Bragta by 1062 votes. Not only this, Leftist CPI(M) candidate Rakesh Singha was also able to win by 1983 votes only. In the state assembly, he was the first leftist after 1996 to reach the state assembly. This time again he is stuck in a four-cornered contest, although his real contest is seen between Kuldeep Singh Rathore of Congress and independent candidate Indu Verma. Indu Verma is the wife of former BJP MLA Rakesh Verma. Rakesh Verma has passed away. Compared to rulling BJP Congress may have less chance to affect from narrow margin. BJP Election strategy which was considered marvelous under Modi-Shah duo and its juggarnut seems to have deeply flawed as faultlines emerging since the time of.distribution of tickets and its prepoll psychosis from AAP. BJP made repeat in Uttrakhand as it succeed to divide opposition vote banks between Congress and AAP. It reduces to non playing actor in Punjab due to strongly facing same division of opposition vote there. In HP, BJP wanted to repeat in the state under laudable Election rehotric Rewaj Badlaw(Change Tradition) but its inner tactics to link AAP with Punjab militancy and alleged incidence of so-called prokhaliistani activities like hosting of Khalistani banner and emblems in Vidhan sabha complex and further action of arresting mineal thieves may spell dooms inthe Election as it could not succeed Uttrakhand here. Under Modi Shaha central government its agencies framed AAP Himachal Pradesh in-charge Satender Jain and than Munish Sisodia. Infact BJP seemed to be counter sudden surge of AAP vote bank in Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh buts this marrow margin in victory or loss.