BJP, Congress confident of winning
HIMACHAL WITNESSED AN ALLTIME HIGH POLLING AT 75.28% THIS TIME, ADEQUATE SECURITY ARRANGEMENTS HAVE BEEN MADE FOR COUNTING
SHIMLA: The fate of 337 candidates including chief minister Virbhadra Singh and his predecessor Prem Kumar Dhumal will be know non Monday as counting of votes is taken up in Himachal Pradesh where traditional rivals B JP and Congress have contested all 68 seats
The hill state witnessed a record 75.28% turnout and pollsters have predicted aB JP victory. Adequate security arrangements have been made for counting which would start simultaneously in all 68 constituencies at 48 counting centres.
Corruption was the main focus of the BJP campaign with the party training its guns at chief minister Singh, while the Congress hit out at the BJP over the issue of G ST and demo net is at ion.
The B SP contested 42 seats followed by the CPI(M) 14, the Swabhiman PartyandtheLok Gathband han Party six each and the CPI-3.
Out of 67 sitting MLAs, 60 MLAS, nine cabinet ministers, HPCC president Sukhvinder Singh Sukkhu, state BJP chief, Satpal Singh Satti, deputy speaker, Jagat Singh Negi and eight chief parliamentary secretaries (CPS) contested the poll along with a dozen former ministers.
Himachal has a tradition of change in government after every elections and going by the trend, this time it is the turn of the B JP which is up beat after exit poll results.
There are 25 Congress, 28 BJP and four independent MLAs in the outgoing house while one seat was lying vacant after death of former minister Karan Singh from Banjar.
Sitting Rajya Sabha member Viplove Thakur (Congress), former Lok Sabha members, Chander Kumar(Congress and Dr Rajan Shushant (Independent) and former Rajya Sabha member K rip al Par mar( B JP) are also among key contestants.
While the BJP is confident of winning the polls with a comfort- able majority, the Congress has rejected the exit polls and claimed that it was all set to repeat.
The BJP ousted the Congress in 1990 and the Congress avenged defeat in 1993. The BJP formed the government with the help of Him ac hal Vik as Congress in 1998 and the Congress was back in power in 2003. The BJP made a comeback in 2007.
A total of 2,820 counting staff has been deployed for Monday’s exercise which includes counting supervisors, counting assistants and micro observers.
Chief electoral officer Pushpender Rajput said three-tier security arrangements have been made at all counting centres. He said wire-mesh barricading has been done at counting centres and there was a separate entry passage for counting staff and counting agents.