Jammu: Chairman of the Dogra Swabhiman Sangthan Party and veteran politician Chowdhary Lal Singh to join congress today.
Sources told Gaontribune, he will join congress at 3:30 pm.
He is likely to be a Congress candidate on the prestigious Udhampur-Doda-Kathua Lok Sabha seat as the party high command has given the green signal for his induction in the grand-old-party.
Highly placed sources said that candidature of the Chowdhary Lal Singh will be announced after he formally joined the party.
Sources in the Congress said that Pradesh Congress Committee (PCC) chief Vikar Rasool Wani is working assiduously to manage the party’s mandate for Chowdhary Lal Singh in Udhampur-Doda Lok Sabha seat to give a tough fight to the BJP’s strong candidate and two-time Lok Sabha member Dr. Jitendra Singh.
As of now, the Udhampur-Doda and Jammu-Reasi Parliamentary segments appear to be a cakewalk for the BJP keeping in view the performance of both the sitting MPs and the prevailing wave of the party on these two Lok Sabha seats.
Sources said that Vikar Rasool Wani has given a clear message to the Chowdhary Lal Singh is the only leader in the Udhampur-Doda-Kathua belt who has the potential to give a tough fight to BJP on this seat.
“Although panels of potential candidates have been forwarded to the central leadership, Wani and some other leaders have asked the high command to reconsider the name of Lal Singh”, sources said and added that by fielding Chowdhary Lal Singh, Wani also wanted to give a message to his former political mentor Ghulam Nabi Azad.
“Lal Singh’s rejoining the party, especially in the present scenario, would prove beneficial for the Congress party in Jammu province during the Lok Sabha elections”, a senior Congress leader had told The Gaon Tribune.
Wishing anonymity, the same leader said that Lal Singh’s rejoining would enhance the prospects of the Congress to effectively face the challenges of the BJP in the Lok Sabha elections.
Founder of the Dogra Swabhiman Sangathan Party (DSSP) Choudhary Lal Singh is a two-time Lok Sabha member and three-time MLA.
Singh switched from Congress to the BJP in 2014 and was also a minister in the previous PDP-BJP government, which collapsed in June 2018.
Singh had been a two-time Lok Sabha member from Udhampur-Kathua parliamentary constituency and a three-time MLA from Basohli.
Last time, he was elected MLA during the 2014 assembly elections as a BJP nominee after he had quit the Congress and joined the Saffron Brigade. He was later inducted as a cabinet minister in the PDP-BJP coalition government.
Later, he floated his own party, Dogra Swabhiman Sangathan, and even contested the 2019 Lok Sabha elections from both the Jammu-Poonch and Udhampur-Kathua constituencies, but lost in both places.
