At that time, the BJP was in power in Himachal Pradesh and the then local MLA Rakesh Pathania, who was also a Cabinet minister, had actively led an aggressive campaign to ensure the victory of every BJP-supported candidate and swept the MC elections. However, the situation has changed considerably since then. The Congress is now ruling the state and the party leadership had shifted Rakesh Pathania to the neighbouring Fatehpur Assembly constituency during the last Assembly elections held in December 2022.
At present, local BJP MLA Ranbir Singh Nikka is spearheading the party’s campaign for the upcoming elections. Most of the outgoing BJP-supported councillors in the corporation have shifted their loyalty from Pathania to Nikka and managed to retain their candidatures. The BJP announced its candidates for all nine wards on Wednesday — Seema Devi (Ward 1), Rajni Mahajan (Ward 2), Raj Kumar Mehra (Ward 3), Ashok Sharma (Ward 4), Ranjna Sharma (Ward 5), Meenakshi Devi (Ward 6), Pushpa Chaudhary (Ward 7), Chirag Gupta (Ward 8) and Vishal Jonda (Ward 9). The BJP-supported candidates for Ward No. 4, 5 and 6 had filed their nominations on Wednesday while the candidates for Ward No. 1, 2 and 3 filed nominations on Thursday.
According to Ashok Sharma, outgoing president of the Nurpur MC, the remaining three candidates for Ward No. 7, 8 and 9 will file nomination on May 2. Meanwhile, the Congress is yet to officially announce its candidates though the local leadership has reportedly finalised the names. The party is expected to release the list in a day or so. For the Congress, regaining the lost political ground in the Nurpur Municipal Council is a formidable challenge and a matter of prestige for former local MLA Ajay Mahajan, who has played a key role in the selection of the party-backed candidates.
Several local issues are expected to influence the voters’ sentiment, including development works undertaken by the BJP-supported MC with the Local Area Development Fund (LADF) of MLA Ranbir Nikka and Kangra MP Rajiv Bhardwaj, downgrading of the over 150-year-old Boys Government Senior Secondary School to a co-educational high school and the stalling of development projects undertaken during the tenure of the previous BJP government in the past over three years under the state government. These factors are likely to play a decisive role in shaping the outcome of the upcoming civic body elections in Nurpur.
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