Leader of the Opposition in the Himachal Pradesh Assembly Jai Ram Thakur said here on Saturday that law and order in the state has completely collapsed and anarchy is at its peak.

Addressing media persons at Nalagarh on Saturday, he accused the Congress government of giving protection to criminals.

“Around 132 cases are registered against a Congress candidate from Nalagarh. Incidents of the shootout are taking place in broad daylight in the court premises, in which the involvement of a Congress leader and former MLA and his son is coming to the fore,” he alleged, adding that such a situation is unfortunate and cannot even be imagined in a peaceful state like Himachal Pradesh.

Slamming the state government, he said, “Had the resignations of the three independent MLAs been accepted earlier, these elections could have been held along with the Lok Sabha elections and by-elections in six Assembly constituencies. The Congress government delayed accepting the resignations of the independent MLAs by pressurizing the assembly speaker, due to which the people of Himachal Pradesh have faced an additional electoral burden.”

Thakur, while addressing two public meetings in Nalagarh, said the state chief minister considered the independent MLAs helpless and wanted to forcibly take their support for all his work.

“The independent MLAs supported him as much as they could but it is not necessary to support everything. During the Rajya Sabha elections, he asked the independent MLAs to vote for the Congress candidate but most of the MLAs supported the BJP candidate Harsh Mahajan, who hails from Himachal. Congress lost despite having a majority. Irked by this, the chief minister started harassing the MLAs on the strength of his power,” he charged.

It has never happened in the history of Himachal wherein the political leaders are harassed, their business, family and relatives were targeted and a conspiracy was hatched to demolish their houses and block roads, he said.

“Due to the harassment of the government, all three independent MLAs were forced to resign and join the BJP so that they could avoid the Chief Minister’s forced support in the House,” he claimed.

In the Lok Sabha elections the people of the state rejected Congress by giving the BJP an edge in 61 out of 68 assembly seats, he said.

Thakur accused the Congress government of Himachal Pradesh of corruption and said the state is lagging far behind in terms of development. “When the BJP was in power, a lot of development work was done in Nalagarh, but the Congress government stopped those schemes,” he blamed.

He said there is an atmosphere of loot in the industrial sector under the patronage of the Congress government due to which industries are forced to leave the state.