Jammu & Kashmir: National Conference Wins through Valley Angst

The Jammu and Kashmir elections have brought the Jammu & Kashmir National Conference (JKNC) to a majority – 42 seats. JKNC’s partner INC won 6 seats. Principal opponent BJP won 29 seats. The results show a clear regional and religious divide: the mostly Muslim Kashmir valley has voted JKNC, while the majority Hindu Jammu plains has voted BJP. The less than 2% Sikhs – whose demands found no mention in either JKNC or BJP manifestos – mostly went with JKNC (SDW Vol 2 Issue 39, Story 3). The elections, conducted on orders of the Supreme Court of India after a decade, were mostly fought on the Indian govt.’s reading down of Article 370 on 5 Aug 2019 and imposing a more than year-long curfew in the valley. The BJP govt. also took away statehood from J&K and reduced the region into two union territories – J&K and Ladakh. Article 370 gave J&K a special status. Article 370 must be seen alongside Article 371, which provides some special powers to states and is already effective in 12 states in the country. None of those states were disturbed. Since J&K is now a union territory, the elections are effectively for an assembly with hardly any powers. However, the valley has mandated its representatives must strive for restoration of J&K’s statehood. JKNC and INC failed to win even one out of 24 seats in Jammu’s Dogra heartland. In a development that has ramifications for Panjab politics, SAD Sudhar Lehar (SL) leaders Prem Singh Chandumajra and Gaganjit Singh Barnala sought votes for BJP’s Narinder Singh Raina in the Jammu-South constituency. Their active participation in Raina’s election campaign has led SAD to question the values of SAD SL.