Breaking with the line toed by former chief ministers Virbhadra Singh (Congress) and Prem Kumar Dhumal (BJP), Chief Minister Jai Ram Thakur on Sunday said it was time to bid adieu to ‘cap politics’ in the state.

“In Himachal, political loyalties were denoted by the colour of the caps. Former chief minister and his supporters used to wear a green-band cap, which had become synonymous with the Congress ideology. However, BJP leaders and supporters wear a maroon band cap,” said Thakur.

“Over the years, these two colours have come to symbolise two different political alignments. But I won’t indulge in cap politics,” he added.

Addressing a gathering at Solan, the BJP CM said he had stopped wearing a cap, thereby putting an end to cap politics. “I prefer the caps as an inseparable part of the culture of Himachal Pradesh and not as a symbol of the regional divide of upper and lower Himachal, as was considered during the Congress regime,” he said. Thakur’s stance targets the political psyche under which former Congress CM Virbhadra Singh, from Shimla district, always dons a Himachali cap with a green flap. His rival, former BJP CM Prem Kumar Dhumal, wears a cap with a maroon band as a matter of distinctive choice.

While different Himachali caps came to signify different regions in the state over the years, the ‘green band’ and the ‘maroon band’ on caps became almost a trademark of the Congress and the BJP, respectively, over last two decades.

As Singh and Dhumal became CMs alternatively since 1998, their supporters too started portraying their political identities with similar caps. Politicians in warmer areas, who don’t need headgear, had taken to green and maroon caps to show political loyalties.

Singh was so touchy about the colour of his cap that if anyone presented him with a maroon cap, he would object.

The ‘cap politics’ is evidently being given a go by in Himachal now with the change in leadership in the BJP and the Congress.

Congress legislature party leader Mukesh Agnihotri and state Congress president Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu do not wear any specific cap.

Similarly, CM Jai Ram Thakur and state BJP chief Satpal Singh Satti are not identified with any particular cap.

The first session of the state Assembly in Dharamshala was also witness to the changing trend.

While many BJP leaders did not wear any Himachali cap, some wore the traditional Kullu cap with a multicolour border.