Virbhadra battles age, corruption charges to take up Congress’ mantle

NURPUR: “I want to die with my boots on.” Chief minister Virbhadra Singh’s hazel eyes crinkle as he said this. The 83-year-old is the campaigner-in-chief of the Himachal Congress, which is up against a resurgent BJP. But Raja sahib, as the six-time CM is called in the hill state, continued to fight valiantly.

“I have lived a good life. There are times I tell myself that enough is enough. But then something happens and I am again thrust into the battlefield,” he said.

The veteran leader admitted that the upcoming polls were proving to be a tough contest. “All my bank accounts have been frozen. I don’t have money to contribute to the elections,” he said.

However, Ranjeet Ranjan, co-in charge of Himachal Congress affairs, said the party believed Virbhadra was enough to take on Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his “selected not elected” men, a jibe at Amit Shah, Smriti Irani and Arun Jaitley who have been campaigning in the state.

Rally after rally, Virbhadra brings up the charges of corruption against him. “I’m not an industrialist or a trader, all my wealth is ancestral.” But the authorities, he said, had decided that his assets were disproportionate to his source of income, as the gathering laughed. There was a round of clapping as he declared, “I have never asked anyone for money, not even for the party.”

Virbhadra said he wasn’t afraid of the BJP’S “intimidatory” tactics. “Mere mein dum hai (I have guts).” His message to party workers is: “Don’t be afraid, people are still with us”.