Assembly bypolls: Voting underway in three constituencies in Himachal

Shimla: Bypolls for three assembly seats in Himachal Pradesh were underway on Wednesday to determine the fate of 13 candidates, including Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu's wife.

A large number of people made a beeline to the polling centres as voting started at 7 am at 315 polling stations in the three assembly segments of Dehra, Hamirpur and Nalagarh. A total of 2,59,340 people are eligible to cast their vote.

The seats fell vacant after the three independent legislators Hoshiyar Singh (Dehra), Ashish Sharma (Hamirpur) and K L Thakur (Nalagarh), who had voted in favour of the BJP in the Rajya Sabha polls held on February 27, resigned from the House on March 22.

They joined the BJP the next day but their resignations were accepted by the Speaker on June 3. Their seats were declared vacant, necessitating the bypolls.

The BJP has fielded all the three independent MLA from their respective seats.

The Congress has fielded Kamlesh Thakur, wife of the chief minister from Dehra, repeated its candidate Pushpinder Verma from Hamirpur and gave ticket to five-time Indian National Trade Union Congress president of the Himachal unit, Hardeep Singh Baba, from Nalagarh.

The results will be declared on July 13.