E-Paper
Seven alumni of Bishop Cotton School in HP poll fray
Vikramaditya Singh, son of Congress stalwart and six-time chief minister late Virbhadra Singh, is an alumnus of the Bishop Cotton School; another former pupil Rohit Thakur, grandson of former CM Thakur Ram Lal has also entered the political arena from the Jubbal-Kotkhai segment and is contesting for the fourth time
Seven candidates in fray for Himachal Pradesh assembly elections have one thing in common. They all are alumni of Shimla-based Bishop Cotton School, one of the oldest boarding facility for boys in the country.
Vikramaditya Singh, son of Congress stalwart and six-time chief minister late Virbhadra Singh, is an alumnus of the Bishop Cotton School. He is contesting his second election from Shimla Rural assembly seat on the Congress ticket. His father had passed out in 1952 from the same school.
Rohit Thakur, grandson of former CM Thakur Ram Lal, has also entered the political arena from the Jubbal-Kotkhai segment and is contesting for the fourth time. Rohit is locked in a five-cornered contest from his traditional seat. He is contesting his second election against Chetan Bragta, a BJP candidate who happens to be his junior from the school.
Chetan, son of former horticulture minister Narendra Bragta, had contested the by-election as an Independent from Jubbal-Kotkhai last year after the BJP denied him a ticket.
Bhawani Singh Pathania, a Congress candidate, had passed out from the school in 1991. He is contesting his second election from his father’s Sujan Singh Pathania seat in Kangra’s Fatehpur. Bhawani had won the by-election necessitated by his father’s death from Fatehpur last year.
Harish Janaratha is contesting his third election from Shimla Urban seat. He had contested assembly elections in 2012 on a Congress ticket, but lost to BJP’s Suresh Bhardwaj. He was denied a Congress ticket in 2017. Harish contested elections as an Independent, but again lost to Suresh. However, the Congress this time reposed faith in him despite party leaders Naresh Chauhan, Pratibha Singh’s staunch loyalist Yashwant Chhajta and Congress general secretary Maheshwar Singh Chauhan vying strongly for the ticket.
Ashish Butail is a sitting legislator who is contesting elections from Palampur for the second time on a Congress ticket. He began his political career from the Indian Youth Congress, the youth wing of the Congress. Ashish was the first elected president of the Lok Sabha Youth Congress Committee, Kangra, from 2011 to 2013. He was then appointed secretary of the HP Congress Committee in 2014. Ashish subsequently got appointed as the treasurer of the Himachal Pradesh Congress Committee and is currently its general secretary. He was elected to the 13th Vidhan Sabha in December 2017.
Vinay Kumar, another former pupil of Bishop Cotton School, is a sitting legislator from Renuka. He is contesting his fourth election.
“I am hugely impressed by the commitment of our school and its staff towards imparting an excellent all-around education to the students. I wish them good luck,” said school director Simon David Weale.
“I have taught many of the students who are contesting elections. They excelled in school in one field or another. I wish them luck and hope they serve the public and live by the school motto of overcome evil with good,” said the senior-most teacher of the school, Vijay Bhardwaj.
Bishop Cotton School was founded on July 28, 1859, by Bishop George Edward Lynch Cotton.
