Nigam Bhandari is president and Yadupati Thakur working president of HP Youth Cong

Nigam Bhandari and Yadupati Thakur have been appointed president and the working president, respectively, of the Himachal Pradesh Youth Congress (YC). Both will be holding the leading positions in the state unit of the party for the first time.

Bhandari belongs to Kinnaur district and has been a part of the Youth Congress for a number of years in Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu’s group. Thakur, who is from Sarkaghat in Mandi district, has also led the National Students’ Union of India, the student wing of Congress, for quite some time. He is known to be close to former chief minister Virbhadra Singh.

Election for the new president was held for the October 30 in which Bhandari polled

40,010, Thakur got 37,375 and another candidate, Amit Pathania, got 5,998 votes. There were 540 NOTA votes.

All three leaders of the YC were interviewed on behalf of the All India Youth Congress in Delhi.

To have a member of Sukhu’s camp as the state YC president is believed to have dealt a big blow to veteran Congressman Virbhadra Singh’s camp, sources say.

However, the Congress high command has tried to reconcile the two factions by appointing Thakur from Virbhadra Singh’s camp as acting president.

Bhandari and Nigam later met Rajiv Shukla, who is in-charge of Himachal Congress, in Delhi.

Congratulating the new leaders, Himachal Pradesh Congress Committee president Kuldeep Singh Rathore said he hoped the YC would make a concerted effort to strengthen the Congress and connect more youth with the organisation.