By IANS
Shimla : Prem Kumar Dhumal, a former English lecturer who took to politics two decades ago, is set to be the new chief minister Sunday of Himachal Pradesh – for a second time.
An unassuming man who easily mingles with people, Dhumal confidently led the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to a facile win in the hill state, one of India’s hottest tourist destinations.
BJP leaders point out that even at age 63, Dhumal, currently a Lok Sabha member from Hamirpur, has the ability to remember by name people he has been introduced to.
He defeated Congress party’s B.C Lagwal by a margin of 26,007 in Bamsom constituency in Hamirpur district.
Born in Hamirpur, Dhumal attended the Tauni Devi government school before moving on to Jalandhar for his college education. After completing his MA in English literature Dhumal taught English literature at Doaba College near Jalandhar in neighbouring Punjab until the early 1980s.
He entered active politics in 1982 when he became the BJP’s Yuva Morcha (Youth Wing) state unit president.
He contested the Hamirpur Lok Sabha seat but lost both in 1984 and in 1996. But he won that seat in 1989, 1991 and again in a 2007 by-election.
Unlike Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, who led the BJP to a spectacular electoral victory earlier this week, Dhumal does not have a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) background.
He was elected president of the Himachal unit of BJP in 1993. It was Modi who helped him to sideline his once-mentor Shanta Kumar and win the top post just ahead of the 1998 polls.
Kumar had become unpopular due to his rigid and tough policies against government employees and farmers in his previous term as chief minister.
Dhumal was in power for five years since 1998. His tenure was known for his development works in the hydel power sector with central aid. Using his goodwill among the top brass of BJP leaders, he managed to rope in considerable central aid to his state during the tenure of the Atal Bihari Vajpayee-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government.
However, his regime became tainted by numerous graft charges against him and some of his cabinet colleagues which eventually led to the BJP’s humiliating defeat in 2003. The Congress, led by Virbhadra Singh, came to power in the state. Dhumal became leader of the opposition in the Himachal assembly.
Dhumal’s wife, a homemaker, keeps a low profile and the couple has two sons. Elder son Anurag Thakur is the Himachal Pradesh unit president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).
Dhumal has so far been succeeded to be in the good books of all prominent party leaders including L.K. Advani, Vajpayee, Modi and party president Rajnath Singh.