BJP State in-charge Avinash Rai Khanna, during his visit to Dharamshala on Friday, said that in the 2019 Lok Sabha election, then party candidate for Kangra Parliamentary seat Kishan Kapoor defeated Congress candidate Pawan Kajal with the highest margin of 4.77 lakh votes.
Addressing party workers, Khanna added that this was the biggest victory margin in the country, and the BJP will continue with this tradition in this Lok Sabha elections too.
However, this time the BJP decided to drop its incumbent MP Kapoor and fielded party’s state vice-president Rajiv Bhardwaj from the Kangra seat. Following this, Kapoor distanced himself from election activities citing health reasons. In fact, even during Khanna’s Dharamshala visit, Kapoor was away in Haridwar.
Kapoor has, however, conveyed his concerns related to the recent happenings in the party to senior leaders. “I have conveyed my concerns about the recent developments, especially the induction of the six Congress rebel MLAs into the party, to the senior leadership. Earlier, I underwent a surgery in AIIMS, Delhi, and now I am in Haridwar for treatment,” Kapoor said, adding that he might return to Dharamshala on April 29.
The four-time MLA from Dharamshala Assembly seat, however, didn’t comment if he will participate in the campaigning.
A former colleague of BJP national president JP Nadda, Kapoor has held important portfolios in the state government during the tenure of Prem Kumar Dhumal and Jai Ram Thakur. A resident of Dharamshala, which is a part of the Kangra Parliamentary constituency, Kapoor was also the Minister for Food and Civil Supplies and Consumer Affairs.
To pacify a visibly upset Kapoor, his son Sashwat was recently appointed state vice-president of Bhartiya Janta Yuva Morcha (BJYM).
Meanwhile, Khanna on Friday attacked the Congress and said that the ruling party in the state was discriminating against Kangra by stalling various development projects, including the proposed Central University.
Khanna, who also met uddhist spiritual leader Dalai Lama, said that BJP MPs have continuously advocated with the central government to resolve the issues of the Kangra parliamentary seat. “The BJP facilitated the expansion of the Gaggal Airport and land was selected for the campus of the Central University in Jadrangal. Our MPs allocated Rs 17 crore for 696 development works, and Rs 1.20 crore was allocated for martyrs’ memorials and renovation. Construction work of Central University buildings worth Rs 250 crore was supposed to start in Dharamshala and Ministry of Environment and Forests clearance was received in June 2023. But it was stalled due to the state government’s failure to deposit Rs 30 crore,” he said, adding that this shows that the Congress government is anti-development and anti-education.
He said that while the BJP always talked of respecting women, the Congress has always promoted new insults. “If 50% reservation is applied in the elections of the heads in Himachal Pradesh, it was imposed by BJP CM Prem Kumar Dhumal, and in the Rajya Sabha, we sent two women representatives, one Bimla Kashyap from Shimla and the other Indi Goswami from Kangra. PM Narendra Modi has made women powerful in Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabha elections in the country by applying 33% reservation. But during the Congress rule in Himachal, women only got betrayal. They did not even receive a single installment of Rs 1500 in the last 15 months as promised by the Congress in its manifesto,” he said.
Highlighting incidents which shows that women are not safe in Himachal Pradesh whenever Congress comes to power, he said that in Gadriyada gram panchayat, 50-year-old Kusum Devi was murdered using a paper cutter. “On April 20, a young man stabbed her 10 times using a paper cutter at the Palampur bus stand. Crimes against women has risen whenever Congress takes over the reigns of the hill state,” he said.