New Delhi: Six-time Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister and senior Congress leader Virbhadra Singh passed away in Shimla on Thursday.
He was 87.
He breathed his last at the Indira Gandhi Medical College and Hospital, Shimla, after a prolonged illness. He succumbed to ailments despite being cured of Covid-19 twice in the past three months.
BJP President JP Nadda and State Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur had visited IGMCH on Monday to inquire about his health.
Singh represented the Arki Assembly constituency in the Solan district of Himachal Pradesh. He was also a nine-time MLA and a five-time MP.
The veteran Congressman had been admitted to a hospital in Chandigarh when he got infected with coronavirus for the first time. He was discharged after recovery. However, as soon as he returned home, he complained of breathlessness and was re-admitted to IGMCH on April 30.
For the first time, he served as the CM from 1983 through 1990 and went on to occupy the chair in 1993, 1998, 2003, and 2012.
Virbhadra Singh had announced his retirement from politics in January 2021, saying that he would not contest the next elections. The Congressman who entered politics at the behest of Former Indian Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi, at the age of 25, had said “some people become Congressmen and defeat the Congress through their actions. Such people should not be kept in the party. I will not contest elections but I will remain a Congressman until my death.”
Currently, his son Vikramaditya Singh is a Congress MLA from Shimla Rural.
(Avya Mathur)
