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Shimla, October 13 (IANS) Congress Parliamentary Party President Sonia Gandhi on Monday unveiled the statue of veteran party leader Virbhadra Singh, who has commanded the state a record six times.
The statue is installed in the Daulat Singh Park on the historic ridge, and is located near the statues of Dr. YS Parmar, the first Chief Minister of Himachal Pradesh, as well as other notable figures such as Mahatma Gandhi and former Prime Ministers Indira Gandhi and Atal Bihari Vajpayee.
Congress MPs Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Deepender Hooda and Rajeev Shukla, AICC in-charge of party affairs in the state Rajni Patil, besides Chief Minister Sukhwinder Sukhu and state cabinet colleagues were present at the ceremony.
The statue was earlier planned to be unveiled on June 23, the birth anniversary of Virbhadra Singh, but it was postponed due to the busy schedule of the party leadership. The invitation for the function was given by Public Works Minister Vikramaditya Singh, the late leader’s son and chairman of Raja Virbhadra Singh Foundation.
Thousands of Virbhadra Singh supporters, elected and former MLAs, former ministers and politicians from neighboring states also attended the ceremony.
Supporters danced to the tune of Himachali folk songs and music and raised slogans to celebrate the occasion.
Veteran Congress leader Virbhadra Singh, who commanded the state a record six times, had dedicated more than 50 years to the common people despite being born in a royal family. The veteran leader passed away early on July 8, 2021, at the age of 87, leaving behind a rich political legacy.
Being a charismatic leader, he was known for having no hesitation in joining hands and bowing before the common people to seek votes for the party – be it assembly elections, parliamentary elections or municipal elections.
Virbhadra Singh, a nine-time MLA and five-time MP who first reached the Lok Sabha in 1962, was often quoted as saying: “I am a grassroots worker. I am raised from the ground up, and my roots are still firmly rooted here (in Himachal Pradesh).”
Known for his generosity, wit and charm, picking out errors in bureaucratic notes and redrafting them on his personal typewriter, Virbhadra Singh was considered one of the greatest leaders of the state, single-handedly fighting and leading many political battles, even when he was eighty years old.
His former cabinet colleagues acknowledged that Virbhadra Singh, popularly known as ‘Raja Saab’ because he was the heir to the erstwhile princely state of Bushehr, did politics on his own terms, rather than relying on his proximity to the party high command.
Singh had experience of working with four Congress Prime Ministers – Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Narasimha Rao and Manmohan Singh.
Virbhadra Singh, who was Chief Minister for more than 21 years, believed, “Bureaucracy is like a horse. If the rider is good, it acts as per his instructions. If the rider is inexperienced, the horse will go out of control and overpower the rider.”
His rivals had accused him of usurping all the space for Congress leadership in the state and not allowing others to grow as per their potential.
Responding to such criticism, he often asked: “Where were they when I was away from state politics for more than three years?”
Virbhadra Singh had resigned as Union Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSME) minister in June 2012 following a Shimla court order in a 23-year-old corruption case.
On December 25, 2012, less than 24 hours before he was to be sworn in as chief minister for a record sixth time, Virbhadra Singh got a major relief as a Shimla court acquitted him and his wife, Pratibha Singh, a two-time MP from Mandi, in a corruption case.
As the chief ministerial candidate in the 2017 assembly elections, Virbhadra Singh had donned his war gear and campaigned almost single-handedly after thwarting his enemies within the party.
He was fielded from Arki in Solan district, said to be a BJP stronghold, which he himself had chosen.
He won the seat and entered the state assembly for the ninth time.
In 2017, his son Vikramaditya Singh also registered his first victory in the assembly elections from Shimla (Rural), the seat previously represented by his father. He retained his seat in the December 2022 elections.
(Vishal Gulati can be contacted at vishal.g@ians.in)
–IANS
VG/DPB