Sukh Ram set to rejoin Cong

Aditi Tandon

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, March 24

Former Telecom Minister Sukh Ram is expected to rejoin the Congress any time now. For the 'ghar wapsi', he will be accompanied by his grandson Ashray Sharma.

The one-time Congress veteran has been in touch with the top leadership with talks on his return said to be in the final stages. Amid possibilities of Sukh Ram’s homecoming, there’s talk that his grandson Ashray could be considered for Congress candidature from the Mandi Lok Sabha constituency.

AICC sources said neither former Himachal CM Virbhadra Singh and his family nor senior state leader Kaul Singh Thakur and his kin were keen from Mandi.

Sukh Ram and his son Anil Sharma had quit the Congress on the eve of the Assembly elections in 2017, citing humiliation by some party leaders. Anil Sharma later won the Mandi Sadar Assembly seat on the BJP ticket and became a minister in the Jai Ram Thakur-led BJP government in Himachal. Anil Sharma was also part of the Cabinet of former CM Virbhadra Singh.

Sukh Ram and his kin had walked out of the Congress in October 2017, claiming some state Congress leaders had asked the former Union Minister to leave the venue of a rally in Mandi that Congress chief Rahul Gandhi was to address. Virbhadra Singh was named the party's CM-candidate at that rally.

The reason for Sukh Ram’s return to Congress could be his concern over the political future of grandson Ashray. The family was hoping he would get the BJP ticket from Mandi but that did not happen. The BJP chose to renominate MP Ram Swaroop Sharma, who defeated Pratibha Singh, Virbhadra Singh’s wife, in 2014.

Though Congress sources claim Sukh Ram have agreed to return unconditionally, there is likelihood of the party considering Ashray’s candidature from Mandi. So far as Anil Sharma goes, it remains to be seen if he resigns from the Jai Ram Thakur Cabinet and joins his father and son in the Congress, as and when the two return to the grand old party after Sukh Ram meets Rahul Gandhi in Delhi.

Anil Sharma had defeated Kaul Singh Thakur’s daughter from Mandi Sadar seat in thelast state polls.

Sukh Ram, who was accused in the infamous telecom scam when he was a minister in the PV Narasimha Rao government, had a prolonged rivalry with Virbhadra Singh. He floated Himachal Vikas Party and helped PK Dhumal become CM in the late nineties.

Sukhram’s ties with the BJP later soured and he rejoined the Congress only to quit in 201. The Mandi Lok Sabha seat will be a prestige battle for Himachal CM Jai Ram Thakur, considering Mandi is his home district.