Three newly elected MLAs take oath in Himachal Pradesh; Sukhu, Jai Ram Thakur trade barbs

Shimla: Himachal Pradesh Vidhan Sabha Speaker Kuldeep Singh Pathania on Monday administered oath to the three newly elected legislators, including Kamlesh Thakur, the wife of Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu.

The oath ceremony was conducted inside the House in the presence of the chief minister, leader of the opposition, cabinet ministers and other members. The members who took oath included Congress MLAs Kamlesh Thakur from the Dehra assembly seat, Hardeep Singh Bawa from the Nalagarh seat and BJP legislator Ashish Sharma from the Hamirpur assembly constituency.

With the induction of the three MLAs, the House is complete with 68 members and the strength of Congress has risen to 40, while BJP has 28 members in the legislative assembly.

There is no independent MLA in the Vidhan Sabha for the first time in the history of Himachal Pradesh. Also, this is the first time a couple, CM Sukhu and his wife Kamlesh Thakur, are members of the same House.

The bye-elections for the three seats -- Dehra, Nalagarh and Hamirpur -- were held on July 10 following the acceptance of the resignation of three independent MLAs, Hoshiyar Singh, K L Thakur and Ashish Sharma.

The three independents along with six Congress rebels had voted in favour of the BJP nominee Harsh Mahajan in the Rajya Sabha polls held on February 27.

On March 22, the three independent MLAs submitted their resignation and joined the BJP the next day.  However, their resignation was accepted by the speaker on June 3. The three Independents were given tickets by the BJP from their respective seats but Ashish Sharma was the only MLA to retain his seats while the other two lost the bypolls to Congress rivals.

Talking to the media persons here, CM Sukhu accused the BJP of hatching a conspiracy to destabilise the government by horse-trading.  In his response, leader of opposition Jai Ram Thakur accused the Congress government of winning the bypolls by misusing the official machinery.

Sukhu hoped that the BJP would now shun the negative politics and cooperate with the government in pursuing the development agenda.  “The people of the state have rejected the politics of toppling the elected government through money power and shown the mirror to the BJP,” the chief minister said.

The BJP forced the by-polls and created political turmoil and as a result, the government could not implement a developmental agenda after passing the budget due to implementation of a model code of conduct, he added.

Reiterating the resolve of the state government to make the state self-sufficient, Sukhu said the Congress government was forced to raise loans to pay the interest and instalment of loans taken by the previous BJP government headed by Jai Ram Thakur.  He claimed that due to prudent policies of the government, the financial condition of the state has improved by 20 per cent.

Thakur said, "The BJP snatched the Rajya Sabha seat, Mandi Lok Sabha seat and three out of nine assembly seats increasing its tally in Vidhan Sabha to 28.”  “We accept the verdict of the people but the results would have been different if the three by-elections caused by the resignation of the Independent legislatures were held simultaneously with six bypolls and Lok Sabha polls,” he said.

Earlier, six assembly seats fell vacant following the disqualification of Congress rebels for defying the whip to vote in favour of the Congress during the budget.  These Congress MLAs had also voted in favour of the BJP candidate in the Rajya Sabha polls.

Thakur accused the government of not implementing its poll promises and said that instead of giving 300 units of free electricity, Congress has deprived a large section of the society of 125 units of free electricity already availed by them.  The Congress party was aware of the financial situation and still, it made false promises to win the 2022 assembly polls, he said.

Interacting with the media persons after taking the oath, Kamlesh Thakur, a first-time MLA, thanked the people of Dehra.  Meanwhile, Bawa, a five-time Indian National Trade Union Congress (INTUC) president of the Himachal unit and also a first-time MLA, said that Nalagarh shares a border with Punjab and law and order is a major issue. He hoped that the government would take effective steps in this regard.

The BJP legislature Ashish Sharma, a two-time MLA, said the people have given a befitting reply to the malicious propaganda of the CM during the elections and added that no development has taken place in Hamirpur during the past 128 months, which forced him to resign.

"Now, I would forcefully take the issues of my constituency in the house,” he said.