J&K elections: 415 candidates vie for 40 seats in final phase
According to Election Commission (EC) officials, 24 of the 40 seats across seven districts are in Jammu and the remaining 16 are in the Valley.
Nearly four million people in Jammu & Kashmir will on Tuesday cast their votes to determine the future of 415 candidates, including 2001 Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru’s brother Ajaz, Peoples Conference (PC) chief Sajad Gani Lone and former deputy chief ministers Tara Chand and Muzaffar Beig, across 40 seats in the third and final phase of the region’s first assembly elections in a decade.
According to Election Commission (EC) officials, 24 of the 40 seats across seven districts are in Jammu and the remaining 16 are in the Valley. Over 3.9 million voters are eligible to exercise their franchise at 5,060 polling stations and more than 20,000 staff were mobilised to oversee the voting process during this phase.
“In this phase, there are 5,060 polling stations across seven districts of Kupwara, Baramulla, Bandipora, Udhampur, Samba, Kathua and Jammu. More than 20,000 polling staff have been deployed on election duty for the final phase. A total of 3,918,220 voters are eligible to exercise their franchise. Of them, there are 2,009,033 male voters, 1,940,092 female voters and 57 third gender voters,” Jammu & Kashmir chief electoral officer PK Pole said.
“Adequate security arrangements have been put in place in the poll-bound areas to ensure terror-free and peaceful polling,” said additional director general of police (Jammu zone) Anand Jain.
The assembly polls are the first in the region since its special status and statehood were scrapped five years ago, and are likely to be the last step before the Union territory’s statehood is restored. There are 90 seats in the assembly. Resumption of dialogue with Pakistan, terrorism, the scrapping of Article 370 of Constitution that gave special status to J&K and the question of statehood for a region that was turned into a Union territory in 2019 were the dominant issues in campaign pitches.
The first phase of voting in 24 seats on September 18 registered a turnout of 61.13%, carrying forward the momentum recorded during this summer’s Lok Sabha polls, when a turnout of 58.46% was recorded, the highest in 35 years. In the second phase, voters across 25 seats continued to turn up in unprecedented numbers, enabling a high turnout of 56.95% in an area otherwise marred by terrorism and violent boycotts.
The contest is between the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a Congress-National Conference (NC) combine, and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). A last-minute alliance between Baramulla lawmaker Sheikh Abdul Rashid’s Awami Ittehad Party (AIP) and politico-religious outfit Jamaat-e-Islami — their candidates are contesting as Independents — and a host of local parties such as the People’s Conference, the Apni Party, and the Democratic Progressive Azad Party (DPAP) are likely to make inroads and skew the electoral arithmetic.
The 24 seats going to the polls in Jammu on Tuesday are Udhampur West, Udhampur East, Chenni, Ramnagar (SC), Bani, Billawar, Basohli, Jasrota, Kathua (SC), Hiranagar, Ramgarh (SC), Samba, Vijaypur, Bishnah (SC), Suchetgarh (SC), R.S Pura, Jammu South, Bahu, Jammu East, Nagrota, Jammu West, Jammu North, Akhnoor (SC) and Chhamb.
The 16 constituencies in the Valley are Karnah, Tregham, Kupwara, Lolab, Handwara, Langate, Sopore, Rafiabad, Uri, Baramulla, Gulmarg, Wagoora-Kreeri, Pattan, Sonawari, Bandipora and Gurez (ST).
The 40 seats will cover critical areas for the BJP, which is traditionally strong in Jammu, and is hoping to find allies that can help it form the next government. In 2014, the party won 25 seats in Jammu and none in Kashmir.
In contrast, the PDP won 28 seats overall, the NC 15 and the Congress 12. The People’s Conference won two seats and CPI(M) one. Back then, the Kashmir region had 46 seats, the Jammu province 37 and Ladakh four, before the boundaries of the constituencies were changed in a delimitation exercise in 2022.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi led the campaign for the BJP and held seven rallies inthe Union territory. On Saturday, he accused the Congress, NC and PDP of inflicting wounds on the people and said the decision to strip the region of its statehood was only temporary.
Union home minister Amit Shah also held several rallies and reiterated that Article 370 would never be restored in the region, even if “five generations” of the Gandhi and Abdullah families of the Congress and the NC attempted to. He also asserted the Centre will not hold any talks with Pakistan until terrorism is eliminated – a promise made by the National Conference (NC) if it is voted to power.
Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge and Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi vowed to fight for the restoration of statehood. Gandhi also said the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA) will use its full force within Parliament and even hit the streets if the BJP-led Centre fails to restore statehood.
Among the key candidates in the fray in Jammu region are Choudhary Lal Singh (Congress, Basohli), Sham Lal Sharma, (BJP, Jammu North), Raman Bhalla, (Congress, RS Pura – Jammu South), former J&K BJP vice president Pawan Khajuria (independent, Udhampur East) and Jugal Kishore Sharma (former Congress minister contesting as independent, Shri Mata Vaishno Devi).
