Vijai Singh Mankotia

Major Vijai Singh Mankotia was an Indian politician and former army officer who represented the Shahpur constituency of Kangra district in the Himachal Pradesh Legislative Assembly five times and served as a cabinet minister in Congress governments led by Virbhadra Singh. He died on 29 September 2026 at the age of 87 after his health deteriorated at his ancestral home in Tiara village in Kangra.

Born in 1939, Mankotia joined the Indian Army in June 1962. He was an outstanding cadet commander at the Indian Military Academy in Dehradun and served with the Gorkha Rifles. He took part in the wars of 1962, 1965 and 1971 and later argued for a dedicated Himachal Regiment and for teaching military traditions in schools. He retired with the rank of Major before entering politics.

He won Shahpur as an Independent in 1982, then joined the Indian National Congress under Rajiv Gandhi and won again in 1985. Around 1989 to 1990 he left Congress for V. P. Singh's Jan Morcha and Janata Dal, helping build that party's foothold in Himachal, and won Shahpur in 1990. He returned to Congress and won again in 1993 and 2003. In Virbhadra Singh's governments he held portfolios including tourism and civil aviation and later served as vice chairman of the state tourism board. He was widely known as an outspoken rival of Virbhadra Singh. In 2007 he released a purported audio CD making corruption allegations against the then chief minister, a dispute that defined a long and public estrangement between the two Kangra heavyweights.

After his fifth win in 2003 he did not return to the Assembly. He contested as a Bahujan Samaj Party candidate in 2007 and was briefly floated as a BSP chief ministerial face, lost later contests for Congress and as an Independent, and joined the Bharatiya Janata Party before the 2022 election without contesting. Through those shifts he remained a familiar figure at public gatherings in Kangra and kept speaking on local development and soldiers' concerns.

Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu, opposition leader Jai Ram Thakur and other leaders paid tribute after his death, recalling both his military service and his decades in the Assembly. His last rites were arranged at Tiara once family members returned from abroad. English language obituaries used both Vijai and Vijay spellings of his given name; Himachal voters knew him simply as Major Mankotia of Shahpur.