Himalayan High

AS HIS CAR enters a 1.8km-long tunnel at Kainchi More on the road leading to Manali, a tourist haven in Himachal Pradesh, Union Minister Anurag Thakur says the tunnels and four-lane highways have cut down travel time from Delhi by about four hours. “No longer will you need to go up to Swarghat and come down, lumbering your way through trucks in Bilaspur,” he says, as pahadi songs composed by local women, in praise of him and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, play on his phone. He flaunts both the road and the music with equal pride.

A familiar face on the roads that lead to Hamirpur, in the foothills of the Himalayas, where he is fighting for a fifth term as the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) Lok Sabha MP, Thakur looks out and waves once in a while, has a chat with people when he stops for tea, and poses for self­ies with bikers from Kolkata who are driving up to the higher reaches.

Thakur is all set to begin his Lok Sabha cam­paign from Hamirpur’s Bilaspur Sadar, a BJP turf where party president JP Nadda has won thrice. “Do you want to leave this country in the hands of Modiji or Rahul Gandhi?” he asks, addressing a rally at Ladda village. He reels out the various development programmes under­taken by the Modi government and specific steps taken for Himachal Pradesh, intermittently breaking into the local pahadi language. Four-page leaflets are distributed, list­ing out all the schemes and development work to the audience, half of whom are women.

Lashing out at Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu’s Congress govern­ment in the state, he accuses it of slowing down development.

As Thakur finishes his speech, he gets off the dais to join the women who start singing songs praising Modi and him. “These women composed the songs spontaneously. One song ‘Modiji badiya raunaka laye schema ne (Modiji’s schemes have brought us lots of happiness)’ went viral,” he says, as he heads for the next public meeting. Thakur is banking on the Modi government’s welfare schemes and infrastructure projects like four-lane na­tional highways, a lifeline for the people in the hills, AIIMS, IIT, and rural roads. His opponents are asking him to spell out his contribution to Hamirpur, particularly the promise of bringing a railway line here. Thakur blames Congress for delaying it.

As his car moves through the hilly rural roads amidst forests of pine and tall bamboo, he says he is aware of the difficulty in getting so many people together in these areas, “the houses are far apart”. At the next stop, Matiyal village in Bilaspur Sadar, he takes on Congress again. “Yeh Sanatan ko kuchalne wale tho Ram Mandir na banate (those who crushed Sanatana Dharma could not have built the Ram temple.)”

In Hamirpur town, 49-year-old Thakur, the son of former Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal, is not only ‘like family’ but also Modi’s representative. “He is a local leader. He has done a lot of work. He meets us regularly, like anyone else. Earlier, for getting a passport made we had to go to Shimla. Now we can do it here,” says Amit Sharma, who runs a children’s clothes shop. Several people say that besides his own “rutba (standing)”, Modi’s “popular­ity” gives an edge to Thakur, pitted against Satpal Raizada, Congress’ former MLA from the Una Assembly seat, which falls in Hamirpur.

“Not many people here know Raizada. He is from Una. Anurag belongs here and if we have a minister in Delhi, he will take up issues concerning Himachal Pradesh,” says Ashok Sharma, a retired engineer. When it comes to the state government, however, the sympathy for the chief minister, a four-time MLA from Nadaun Assembly of Hamirpur, is discernible. In January, Sukhu laid the foundation stone of four projects worth ₹108 crore in Nadaun. Sharma is of the view that Congress should be given a chance and time to complete its five-year term. His friend Satish Sharma, who runs an electrical shop, agrees with him, referring to the cross voting in Rajya Sabha in which nine MLAs voted for BJP’s candidate, a move that threatened to destabilise the Congress government in the state. Though this does not seem to have gone down well among people, they say it is unlikely to influence the Lok Sabha election as people differentiate between politics in the state and at the Centre.

Asked if attempts to destabilise the state government could boomerang on BJP, Thakur, the minister for information and broadcasting, youth affairs and sports, says, “Not really, because Congress has failed to fulfil promises like giving ₹1,500 to women per month, buying cow dung for ₹2 and milk for ₹100 per litre, five lakh jobs, ₹600 as start-up fund, good MSP for the fruit growers. On all fronts they have failed, development work has been halted. Its government has taken ₹28,000 crore loans in 16 months.”

The political blame game is gaining momentum in the state where, besides the four Lok Sabha constituencies, six Assembly bypolls, which could decide the fate of the state government, are also due on June 1. After disqualification of six Congress MLAs for defying the whip issued by the party to be present in the Assembly on budget day, the strength of the 68-member House came down to 62 and that of Congress to 34. BJP has 25 seats, and there are three independents. For Congress it is critical to win back the seats to secure its government against the risk of being brought down.

The chief minister, at a rally in support of Raizada in Zakatkhana, surrounded by the Bhakra Nangal Dam reservoir, in Hamirpur’s Bilaspur, takes on the Modi government at the Centre, former Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur, and also Anurag Thakur. He alleges that BJP has been winning the Lok Sabha seat from Hamir­pur for 26 years but has not been able to bring any major scheme to the constituency. The state government is paying 50 per cent cost of the Bhanupali-Bilaspur-Leh railway line worth ₹1,250 crore, for which it has also given the land, says Sukhu as he gives an account of 15 months of his government’s performance. He also counters ac­cusations that his government was not giving the promised ₹1,500 a month to women, saying those who have filled forms will get ₹3,000 for May and June after elections. Both Sukhu and Raizada criticise the Centre’s Agniveer scheme, saying it has broken the hearts of the youth who want to join the Army.

Held by BJP since 1998, Hamirpur has 17 Assembly segments of which Congress had won 10, BJP five and independents two in the 2022 Assembly elections. Of the six Assembly segments heading for bypolls, four—Sujanpur, Barsar, Gagret, Kutlehar— fall in Hamirpur. The other two are Dharamshala in Kangra Lok Sabha constituency where BJP’s Rajeev Bhardwaj is fielded against Anand Sharma of Congress, and Lahaul and Spiti in Mandi, where BJP has fielded actor Kangana Ranaut against state PWD Minister Vikramaditya Singh, who is the son of party veteran and former Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh. In Shimla, Congress’ Kasauli MLA Vinod Sultanpuri, son of former minister Satpal Singh Sultanpuri, will take on BJP MP Suresh Kashyap.

While Sukhu takes a dig at Jai Ram Thakur, saying the suit he ordered for stitching after his party’s attempts to topple his gov­ernment was still with the tailor, Anurag Thakur alleges that the nine MLAs—six Congress and three independents—switched sides during the Rajya Sabha election mainly due to “poor gov­ernance” from Congress, the working style of the chief minister, and the “failure” to fulfil promises. He, however, denies that there is rebellion within BJP. The party recently expelled two rebel can­didates who had refused to withdraw their nominations from the Assembly bypolls in Dharamshala and Lahaul and Spiti where BJP has fielded Congress turncoats. Both Sukhu and former Chief Minister Thakur are exuding confidence that their respective par­ties will win the bypolls. “The prime minister’s image as a strong, clean and decisive leader and his pro-development model is the biggest strength for the party. When people compare UPA’s 10 years and Modi’s 10 years, they see a sea-change. And, Modiji treats Himachal Pradesh as his second home,” says Anurag Thakur.

IN HAMIRPUR’S BUSTLING Gandhi Chowk market, politics is in the air as the sun sets and the lights from the shops, on either side of the narrow road, cast a warm glow. Prakash Chand Pathania, 77, who retired from the electricity board, recalls how people had to walk miles before there were proper roads. Deepak Sharma, a jeweller, praises the highways, tunnels, the Vande Bharat train from Delhi to Amb, giving credit for it to Modi and Thakur. Another jeweller, Anmol, says Nitin Gadkari got the highways and the bus stand work is being done by the Congress government in the state, and asks why Thakur has not delivered on the promised train to Hamir­pur. He agrees that Thakur has a hold over Hamirpur but says Raizada may get some support in the Una and Bilaspur seg­ments of the constituency. Away from the city, at Ladraur town of the Bhoranj Assembly segment, which Congress won in 2022, Pankaj, who runs a bangle shop, praises both Modi and Thakur. “Anuragji has worked. I have not seen Raizada.” In Zakatkhana, as the chief minister’s convoy passes by after the rally, Bittoo, work­ing at a dhaba says BJP supporters’ vote will go to Modi and that of Congress to Virbhadra Singh.

In Hamirpur, Anurag Thakur is Modi’s representative. Several people say that besides his own rutba (standing), Modi’s popularity gives an edge to Thakur, pitted against Satpal Raizada, Congress’ former MLA from the Una assembly seat which falls in Hamirpur

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Thakur says he has taken “out-of-the-box” initiatives for his constituency—Sansad Mobile Swasthya Sewa—a mobile hospi­tal which goes to villages and has so far attended to and treated people in 8,000 villages; Sansad Mahakumbh, under which one lakh youth have been inspired to join sports; Ek se Shreshtha, giving 11,000 poor children tuitions; Hunar se Shikhar, train­ing women in a skill and a programme which takes meritorious students across the country to give them exposure.

A political worker from a young age, politics was not Thakur’s first choice, playing cricket having been his dream. When BJP’s Hamirpur MP Suresh Chandel had to resign in 2007 after his name came up in the cash for query scam of 2005, BJP leader Arun Jaitley approached Thakur to contest the bypoll. At that time, he was Himachal Pradesh cricket president. “He thought I was popular among the youth. When he asked I told him I was not keen. My family was also not interested. After that I did not see him for three months.” Later, the parliamentary board de­cided that Dhumal would contest the Lok Sabha bypoll in 2007. Months later, when BJP won the Assembly election, Dhumal became chief minister. The Hamirpur seat fell vacant again and Thakur contested in 2008, and has been winning it ever since. Thakur’s cricket dream was shattered but he is proud that he was instrumental in building four stadiums in a state where there was none.

Asked how this Lok Sabha election is different from 2014 and 2019, Thakur says 2014 was a wave against Congress corruption and misgovernance, 2019 was about the achievements of the Modi government, and 2024 is about Viksit Bharat. “Now this aspirational India wants to become a developed India by 2047. For that you need continuity and stability in government, lead­ership, policies and programmes. So, people have realised that a government with a full majority helps in delivering and in taking necessary, strong decisions.”

He attributes the dip in voting percentage to Congress vot­ers and supporters getting “demoralised” with their leadership. “They don’t see Congress to be in the race. There is friction in states from West Bengal to Punjab, which indicates infighting in the alliance.” Congress, as part of the I.N.D.I.A. bloc, is contest­ing 328 of the 543 Lok Sabha seats, its lowest number ever.

Whether in the state or at the Centre, Thakur says he has en­joyed all the stints and ministries. “My heart is in whatever work is before me.” The pahadi songs start playing again as he looks out of the window at the view of the Bhakra Nangal Dam’s reservoir.

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Amita Shah