Advantage BJP in Himachal

DHARAMSALA: With the formal electioncampaign coming to close on Saturday evening, all was set for the polling in thestate to be held on Monday. All the four Lok Sabha constituencies ofthe state - Kangra, Hamirpur, Mandi and Shimla will witness a straight contestbetween the BJP and Congress, though, some other political parties have alsofielded their candidates, and however, they were expected to make much of animpact. Both the BJP and Congress ran their campaign extensively,but, the former seems to be holding clear advantage in two of the constituenciesof Kangra and Hamirpur, while in Mandi, the BJP has a slight edge over Congress.The Congress appears to be in good position to regain the ShimlaParliamentary seat regret to be its stronghold. As far as Kangra Parliamentaryconstituency was concerned, the Congress struggled to find a suitable candidateto take on mighty Shanta Kumar, the BJP nominee former Union Rural DevelopmentMinster picked up its campaign late due to delay in naming its nominee, ChanderKumar, the state forests minister. Despite the Congress intensifiedits pace of campaign midway, but it could not go far to that extent to challengeShanta''s ascendancy. The Congress repeated the same story of Kangra in HamirpurParlaiementary constituency, as it had to grapple with a problem of finding asuitable candidate even from here. The Congress finally decided togive ticket to Thakur Ram Lal from Hamirpur Parliamentary constituency, thestate industries minister who had been unwilling like party''s nominee ChanderKumar from Kangra to contest initially.Due to delay in naming thecandidate from Hamirpur constituency also, the Congress had to bear a great lossas it let the advantage shift significantly towards the BJP and its candidateSuresh Chandel. Congress despite making late surge in Hamirpur, seems to be onweak wicket due to lack of cohesion in its campaign.In Mandiconstituency, which would witness a direct fight between BJP''s nominee MaheshwarSingh and Congress candidate Pratibha Singh, the wife of Chief MinisterVirbhadra Singh, the Congress at one stage to be in comfortable position to winafter the re-entry of Sukh Ram, former Union Minster of State forTelecommunication seems to have frittered away the advantage towards the finalstages of the campaign, as it could not sustain its momentum, due to which theadvantage has swung towards the BJP. However, Congress was likely toregain the Shimla Parliamentary constituency in view fo the fact that it managedto woo Dhani Ram Shandil, the sitting MP who had contested the previous LSelections from here on HVC ticket enjoys good image and has a solid base. TheBJP which has fielded H N Kashyap, retired HAS officer let the advantage slipaway towards Congress by delaying the naming of its candidate and moreover,Shimla Parliamentary constituency traditionally vote for Congress.The political observes feel that the BJP banking on Prime MinsterVajpayee''s popularity in Himachal and anti-incumbency against the Virbhadragovernment could retain three of the seats of Kangra, Hamirpur and Mandi,whereas the Congress was expected to win the Shimlaseat.