Congress takes steps to save HP govt; Sukhu battles in-house challenge
economictimes.indiatimes.comCongress MLAs for staying away from assembly during the passing of the financial bill on Wednesday, Himachal CM Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu and Congress leadership were on Wednesday battling to save the CM's chair and the state government, a fallout of the clinical internal ambush of the party's Rajya Sabha candidate. This, even as state minister Vikramaditya Singh, son of the late Virbhadra Singh, resigned — who later clarified that he wasn't pressing for it — by raising a banner of revolt against the leadership of Sukhu, who had stood up to Vikramaditya's late father, a six-term CM, during his heydays.
CM Sukhu ruled out resignation and opted to fight it out in a full-fledged power-struggle against BJP in the backdrop of delicate number games, check-mating moves and prospective legal wrangle.
With the CM's detractors seeking a change of guard, the three AICC observers in Shimla, at the time of going to press, were gauging the views of individual party MLAs for submitting a report to the Congress chief.
Maintaining that Congress' priority is to save its government, AICC spokesman Jairam Ramesh said: «Individuals are not important, the party's interest is supreme. More than the party's interest, it is the mandate of the people that was given in December 2022.» Post-2022 victory, Sukhu had beaten PCC chief Pratibha Singh (Vikramaditya Singh's mother) to win the CM's post by rallying bigger support among the party MLAs.
