J&K Polls Phase 1: Suspected Pawns and Ploys Actually Boosting Secular Parties

Voters queue up outside a polling booth in Jammu and Kashmir's Pulwama.

(Photo: PTI)

Could it possibly be that the Centre’s—and/or the agencies’—actual oblique strategy is to help the National Conference gain seats in the ongoing assembly elections for the union territory of Jammu and Kashmir? 

BJP leader Devendar Rana insists that there is no question of the BJP forming a coalition with either the NC or the PDP, and Kashmiris who are close to either the agencies or the BJP insist that the objective is to form a BJP-led government with a Hindu chief minister supported by a host of small groups and independents. 

And yet, whatever they are doing—supposedly behind the scenes, but pretty obviously—is helping the secular alliance win more seats. 

The BJP itself is unlikely to win any Valley seats. It is really only in the fight in Gurez—although BJP insiders claim to have a strong presence in the Anantnag West constituency too. Now that Sajad Lone of the People’s Conference has attacked the BJP, and the other two parties that might support the BJP in the assembly are only in the fight in a couple of constituencies each, things are looking pretty bleak for it.  

As for the erstwhile `separatist’ parties—who more and more Kashmiris suspect are pawns of the BJP, now that the first phase of the elections is over, it seems unlikely that they will win a single seat in this phase.  

In fact, the Jamaat-e-Islami (JeI) and `Engineer’ Rashid’s AIP are only chipping away votes from that other party that plays footsie with separatism, the PDP—and are likely to do the same to Sajad Lone’s People’s Conference in north Kashmir.  

In any case, there is widespread disgruntlement within the JeI against the chief’s decision, at the instance of agencies, to back independent candidates. Relatively few JeI members are likely to vote. 

All of this works to the advantage of the secular National Conference-Congress alliance, which seems set to win eight to ten of the 16 Valley seats that polled on Wednesday. Two (Shopian and Tral) could go to independents. Since both are in the fray because NC refused them tickets, they could return to the fold, especially if ministerial berths were to be offered. 

As things stand, the alliance (led by NC) could sweep up to 12 of the 15 seats in central Kashmir in the second phase. Again, presumed `separatists’ pose little challenge there, and parties presumed to be open to allying with the BJP are in the fight in only two central Kashmir constituencies—Zadibal and Chhanapora. 

Bitter Attack by Sajad Lone 

This emergent scenario leads one to question what might actually be the strategy of the Centre—and/or the agencies, which have always tended to be hyper-active in Kashmir. 

Sajad Lone’s recent press conference revealed that he has become convinced that the agencies, and those in power at the Centre and in the RSS, want his party to lose. That allegation marked quite a shift for someone who once called Prime Minister Modi his elder brother. It seemed to end the possibility of his People’s Conference (PC)  party joining a BJP-led coalition, which had hitherto been taken for granted. 

Sajad seemed so convinced of a conspiracy against him that he chose to flail at all three (agencies, Centre, and RSS) just when a seat-sharing alliance had been brokered between the JeI and the AIP.

The next step could have been an adjustment with Sajad’s PC too, for his and AIP’s strongholds overlap, and are to poll only in the last phase on 1 October. But Sajad’s public accusations put paid to that possibility. That too will help NC. 

Sajad specifically and repeatedly said that he would not ask Irfan Sultan Panditpuri, PC’s candidate for the Langate constituency to withdraw. Rashid represented Langate in the assemblies elected in 2008 and 2014, and his brother is contesting these elections from there.  

Indeed, Sajad announced that Rashid had telephoned him asking that Panditpuri not be fielded for the chair of the Kupwara District Development Board. So far, Panditpuri, who holds that chair, seems to have the edge in Langate.  

He added that he wasn’t sure whether Rashid had phoned (on his brother’s phone) from jail or from some restaurant—evidently seeking to add to the fast-spreading suspicion that Rashid’s presence is an agency ploy. He pointedly mentioned that Rashid had obtained bail from a Pulwama court, and that the NIA had not opposed it. 

Agencies’ Games? 

Sajad held that this operation is the clumsiest by the agencies since `47—but one wonders. Such strategies can oftentimes be multi-layered, and oblique. 

If one objectively assesses what is transpiring on the ground, the JeI and the AIP are losing credibility. If—as seems likely—they win very few seats, that could undermine public support for the long-established infrastructure of separatism in Kashmir. 

In the bargain, the PDP and PC too are losing out, for JeI and AIP are chipping away at their vote shares rather than those of the secular alliance. Sajad announced that Central leaders had told eight Kashmiri leaders who had been to Delhi over the past few months that Sajad could not be trusted since his father and father-in-law had both been separatists. 

The PDP too has in the past been seen as a proxy in south Kashmir for JeI—which had close links with the terrorising Hizb-ul Mujahideen during most of the `90s. Former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti, who has been the party’s president since its inception 25 years ago, often expressed sympathy for the families of killed militants and spoke up for detainees.  

She now hopes to hand over the reins of her party to her daughter, Iltija, who is contesting from the family’s home constituency, Bijbehara. Iltija tends to target the BJP over the treatment of India’s Muslims—as does the MP for Srinagar, Aga Rohullah of NC.  

Although the Congress, NC’s alliance partner, is doing precious little to win the large number of seats it is contesting in the Jammu division—where the BJP faces an intense anti-incumbency sentiment—the NC’s quiet credibility, even in that region, might still bring the coalition a majority of the assembly’s 90 seats. 

(The writer is the author of ‘The Story of Kashmir’ and ‘The Generation of Rage in Kashmir’. He can be reached at @david_devadas. This is an opinion piece and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)