Himachal Pradesh assembly elections 2017: The Congress on Monday released a list of its star campaigners for the Himachal Pradesh Assembly polls. The long list of star campaigners of the Grand Old Party consists of 40 top delegates which includes President of Congress Sonia Gandhi, Vice President Rahul Gandhi, former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Punjab CM Amarinder Singh amongst others, reported ANI. Notably, Priyanka Gandhi will not be participating in the elections. The Himachal Pradesh election is scheduled to take place on November 9. Earlier on Sunday, the Congress had announced the second list of candidates for the state election, withholding the names of its nominees for just two seats including the prestigious Shimla Rural constituency currently held by Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh, as per PTI report. The chief minister has moved to the Arki Assembly seat in Solan district and the party has declared his candidature from there. The party has also withheld the name of its candidate for the Mandi constituency from where state minister Kaul Singh Thakur’s daughter Champa has demanded the party ticket. Kaul Singh Thakur has been fielded from the Darang Assembly constituency. Monday is the last day for filing of nominations for the election to the 68-member Assembly.
The Congress had also released its first list of 59 candidates earlier on October 18. According to party sources, the Congress is taking its “one family, one ticket” formula, whereby only one member of a family would be made party candidate, seriously and this is the reason for it not declaring candidates for Shimla Rural and Mandi seats. In the second list of candidates, the Congress fielded Kewal Singh Pathania from Shahpur and Ashish Butail from Palampur, currently held by outgoing Speaker Brij Bihari Lal Butail, who did not want to contest this time. Ashish Butail is the son of the outgoing Speaker.
