He didn’t want his wife to contest the elections, but a top Indian National Congress leader insisted: Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukh.

Indian National Congress Party leader and Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Sukhbinder Singh Sukh on June 19 said he did not want his wife to contest the election, but party leaders insisted that she should, and announced his candidacy for the Dera Assembly by-election.

Sukhu’s wife, Kamlesh Thakur’s name was on the list of candidates released by Indian National Congress general secretary KC Venugopal on June 18. She is running in the Dera constituency against Hoshiar Singh, a two-term independent member of the state assembly who is running in this election as a BJP candidate.

“I did not want my wife to contest elections, but I could not refuse it to the Indian National Congress leadership,” Sukhu told reporters late on June 18. He said party leaders had also told Thakur that he should contest the Lok Sabha elections, but “I had no intention of doing so.”

“This time too, the high command strongly encouraged me, so I couldn’t refuse,” he said, given the political situation in the state. He said that although his wife had emerged as the front-runner in the party’s polls, he did not want her to run as he believed he was the only one in his family who was involved in politics.

“But given the political situation in the state, there was a need for a strong candidate to be fielded from Dera Assembly constituency,” he said. “My wife is from Dera, her family also lives there and even the Assembly representative wanted her to be fielded, so I couldn’t say no to the commander in chief.”

“I had earlier said, ‘Dera is my home town’. My wife will represent me in Dera for the next three-and-a-half years and ensure the development of the area,” Sukhu added.