Shimla, May 16 (IANS) The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Himachal Pradesh, which won three of the four Lok Sabha seats in the hill state Saturday, attributed its victory to good governance and its development plank.
Expressing happiness over BJP’s performance in the state, Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal told IANS: “This is BJP’s victory. I want to thank our supporters and all the voters. We are going to work harder to live up to their expectations.”

He said the verdict had proved that there was no anti-incumbency.

“Their (Congress) claims have been proved wrong. People have voted for development,” he said.

The BJP won three seats - Shimla, Hamirpur and Kangra - and the Congress won Mandi.

Five-time former Congress chief minister Virbhadra Singh, 74, defeated his nearest rival Maheshwar Singh of the BJP by 13,438 votes.

Popularly known as ‘Raja Saab’, Virbhadra Singh has contested the parliamentary elections after 29 years.

Virbhadra Singh bagged 342,970 votes and Maheshwar Singh got 329,532 votes.

The Congress leader belongs to the erstwhile royal family of Bushehr, while the BJP nominee is the scion of the erstwhile royal family of Kullu.

Dhumal’s son and sitting BJP MP Anurag Thakur won the Hamirpur seat. He defeated his nearest rival, Narinder Thakur, of the Congress by 72,732 votes.

For the first time, the BJP managed to win the Shimla seat, which was a known Congress bastion.

Kashyap defeated two-time Congress MP Dhani Ram Shandil by a margin of 27,327 votes.

This was a maiden victory for Kashyap and the BJP both on this reserved seat.

Kashyap, who had earlier lost all the 10 elections including six parliamentary in his three-decade-long political career, got 310,946 votes and Shandil got 283,619 votes.

For Kangra seat, sitting Congress MP Chander Kumar was defeated by BJP’ Rajan Sushant.

In the 2004 general elections, the Congress had won the Shimla, Kangra and Mandi parliamentary seats, while the BJP got the Hamirpur seat.