In the 2014 assembly elections, when Jammu and Kashmir was still a state, the Bharatiya Janata Party got its highest tally of 25 out of 37 assembly seats. In 2019, the region lost its autonomy and was cleaved into two demoted union territories (Ladakh not having an elected assembly).
Now, as campaigning picks up momentum in the 2024 Jammu and Kashmir polls, amidst a changed geographical and political landscape, the BJP sees this as an opportunity to install its government with a Hindu chief minister.
In a house of 90 legislators, anyone requires 46 to stake claim to form government. With an altered electoral map that gave six additional seats to Jammu as against one to the Kashmir Valley, and increased the Hindu majority from 24 to 31, the BJP hopes to improve its previous tally.
Apart from the redistricting of boundaries, the BJP also has the added advantage of the altered laws that provide for five nominated members with voting rights to make up any shortfall. In short, while any other political entity would require 46 seats to stake a claim to government formation, the BJP would require only 43. It doesn’t require rocket science to figure out who the Lieutenant Governor-appointed nominees would vote for.
But it may face the disappointment of the electorate in the Hindu heartland owing to the adverse economic fallout of the abrogation of Article 370, and increasing unemployment. Far from reaching the magic figure of 43, even retaining 25 seats may be a tall order for the BJP.
The party would then hope to make gains from a division of votes in the Muslim-majority constituencies of Jammu province, especially where the National Conference-Congress alliance, the main formidable challenge to the BJP, falters. An easy chance has been provided by the latter by weakening its alliance in five constituencies including four in Jammu province by fielding separate candidates in what they have termed a ‘friendly contest’, which is a misnomer.
At least in two – Doda and Bhaderwah – of the three segments located in the Muslim-majority constituencies in Chenab Valley, the BJP could manage to reap the benefits of the division of votes between the National Conference, Congress, and other parties like the People’s Democratic Party.
In Jammu province, the BJP’s main opponent is the Congress. The Congress, whose vote share improved in the last parliamentary election, is likely to perform better than the last assembly elections in 2014.
Both parties may receive setbacks in their respective strongholds given party factionalism. Pertinently, the BJP started election campaigning on the wrong footing by fielding new faces and ignoring old party guards, compelling the party high command to belatedly alter the ticket list. Though amidst hectic election campaigning, the party is less visible on the ground, it is focusing on consolidation of its committed vote bank through personal outreach with an army of RSS cadres and BJP activists fanned out in different corners of Jammu province.
Even if the party manages to improve its previous tally, it would still be way short of the requisite 43 seats. In such an eventuality, it would need to cobble the support of Kashmir-based parties to stake claim to form a government. In most likelihood, no Kashmir-based party of reckoning would risk being seen in proximity with the BJP. Its mere touch, like the mythical Bhasmasur, can be lethal.
Political parties are especially aware of the long-term fallout of any rapprochement with the BJP. In the recent parliamentary polls, the PDP was routed primarily owing to its notorious alliance of the BJP in 2014. Parties like the People’s Conference, Apni Party and Ghulam Nabi Azad’s Democratic Progressive Azad Party were also decimated after they were seen as hobnobbing with the BJP, earning them the tag of BJP’s ‘B-team’.
So, whatever their respective narratives, the main campaign pivot for these parties since 2019 has been criticism of the BJP and its policies. While one might wonder why they are then not contesting in a grand alliance, the fact remains that a fractured Valley verdict suits the BJP since it makes competition for government formation easier.
Which is why questions are now being asked on whether the multiplicity of parties and individuals in the fray for the valley’s 47 seats are by default – or by design and manipulation.
Decoding the participants
Of the 330 contestants in the fray in the first two phases of the elections to be held on September 18 and 25, the majority of them are fielded in Kashmir Valley.
Kashmir is witnessing unprecedented electoral enthusiasm with the battlefield filled with an array of contestants from the NC-Congress alliance, People’s Democratic Party, People’s Conference and Apni Party. There are 179 independents, including those fielded by the Awami Ittehad Party and Jamaat-e-Islami which decided to stop boycotting politics after almost four decades.
The PDP might be weakened after it allied with the BJP in 2014 but it’s still not a force that can be easily written off. It continues to hold sway in some pockets of south Kashmir and has enlarged its influence in the Muslim-dominated areas of Jammu region – in Pir Panjal and, to a lesser extent, in the Chenab Valley.
The NC, owing to decades of its presence and its committed cadres at the grassroots, continues to have a pan-J&K appeal with its larger base in the Valley.
But what might have appeared to be a direct contest is queered by the entry of other players, particularly Engineer Rashid’s Awami Ittehad Party, which is fielding about 40 contestants as independents, and the Jamaat-e-Islami, which is backing half a dozen independents. Engineer Rashid enthused energy into the parliamentary polls by contesting from jail and trouncing NC dynast Omar Abdullah by a huge margin in north Kashmir. Whether the interest his release has generated will translate into votes this time remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, the People’s Conference and Apni Party, after their recent debacles, are not likely to get much in terms of seats. But their presence in the fray, along with other small contestants, is likely to impact electoral outcomes in some constituencies. These small, almost unknown, contestants include the Garib Democratic Party, Aman Aur Shanti Tehreek-e-Jammu and Kashmir, All Jammu and Kashmir Liberal Democratic Party, and Jammu and Kashmir Nationalist People’s Front.
There are parties with no regional presence like the Anarakshit Samaj Party, Sampoorna Bharat Kranti Party, National Loktantrik Party, and Republican Party of India. Also in the fray are candidates of prominent national parties like the Rashtriya Janata Dal, Samajwadi Party and Nationalist Congress Party, all of which are part of the Congress-led INDIA alliance but have fielded their own against the NC-Congress alliance in Jammu and Kashmir.
Finally, the independents – 179 of them.
Besides contestants backed by the Awami Ittehad Party and Jamaat-e-Islami, there are disgruntled leaders from various political parties. There’s also Sarjan Barkati, the jailed cleric seen to be a separatist face, and Ajaz Guru, brother of Afzal Guru who was sent to the gallows after his conviction in the Parliament attack case.
What explains this sudden epidemic of independents and intriguing entrants into the electoral fray?
Spate of new faces
Kashmir is no stranger to conspiracies, given the history of political manipulations by New Delhi. Questions are thus being raised about whether this is being engineered to break Kashmiri homogeneity, especially since the biggest gainer of an electorally fractured Valley would be the BJP. The saffron party stands to gain not only by increasing its seat share but also by decimating the two main regional parties – the NC and PDP.
Some of these suspicions are not unfounded. The unprecedented levels of repression and surveillance in Kashmir since 2019 are in striking contrast to the candidates contesting from jails with ease. Eyebrows are also raised at how Engineer Rashid, who was let out on bail in a UAPA case to be able to campaign, is managing to unequivocally speak against the BJP without any reprisal.
Elections require resources. Rashid’s parliamentary poll phenomenon was seemingly built up organically on the voluntary support of villagers where his appeal held sway. For his cash-starved one-man party, replicating that feat in 40 constituencies would be too incredible to be true.
His party’s entry into the election in a big way is, by and large, looked upon with scepticism. But in his home turf in Langate and Kupwara, the independents backed by his group may make formidable gains. His fiery speeches, since his release, are also catching on and the public is getting more enthused even as questions are being asked whether he’s a saviour, as he projects, or a pawn on Kashmir’s larger chessboard.
Whatever be the case, Rashid is likely to benefit from the overall scepticism of mainstream political parties in Kashmir – either for their proximity with the BJP in recent times or for betrayals at the behest of New Delhi in the past. The National Conference’s alliance with the Congress, which is seen as responsible for the manipulations before 2014, does not also sit well with the Kashmiri imagination and aspirations.
In terms of seats, the NC or PDP may lose only a handful of precious seats to some strong contenders in the Valley. But the optics of blaming and name-calling that Rashid’s entry in the fray has triggered has handed the BJP the weapon it needed as a selling point in the Jammu region. Here, disgruntled voters, hoping for an NC-led government to reverse some of the destruction of the region’s economy and address the issue of joblessness, can be easily turned around by convincing them that the Valley’s verdict would be split, disabling the NC from staking claim to forming a government.
The mutual bickerings, instead of focusing on critiquing BJP’s policies, will also impact post-poll dynamics. A handful of seats in Rashid’s kitty and the PDP would make the task of forming permutations and combinations after the polls, should the NC-Congress fall short of the required numbers, much more difficult.
The alliance may have itself to blame for keeping the PDP out of it, or entering into silly ‘friendly contests’ where it could have registered easy victories.
Ideologically, it may still be better placed than the BJP to enter into post-poll alliances with different formations, including Rashid’s. But given the central government’s repressive control of Kashmir, the real advantage would be the BJP’s if there is a hung assembly – chances of which are quite high.
Lessons can be learnt from the DDC elections of 2020-2021 when the People’s Conference mysteriously walked out of the Gupkar Alliance midway and when elected members of the PAGD were coerced into defecting and reducing the alliance’s majority in several of the councils.
In all probability, the election drama is likely to play out long after the counting is done and over with. How much the BJP would be able to leverage its muscle power post-elections will depend on the final tally and the strength of the NC-Congress alliance. The latter would need to adopt a more pragmatic and realistic approach, rather than fall prey to false egos.
The writer is the managing editor of Kashmir Times and the author of A Dismantled State: Untold Story of Kashmir After Article 370 (Harper Collins, 2023).
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