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| Will people vote for change in J&K ? | | |
Now that the Election Commission of India has rejected National Conference plea for postponement of the Assembly election by announcing a schedule for the five-phase poll in Jammu and Kashmir,time has come when one has to watch whether the Commission's experiment will prove successful or be simply a misadventure. First of all the Commission and the Government have to initiate steps that could ensure good polling percentage.Steps need to be taken to ensure that separatists were not successful in enforcing their poll boycott call.In 2008 Assembly election eight Assembly constituencies in Srinagar district had recorded 20 per cent polling and it was because of high polling percentage in some border areas of the Valley and in the region of Jammu that the overall polling percentage had touched 60 per cent.In the May last Lok Sabha election there was a voter turn out of 25 to 26 per cent in various segments of Srinagar and Anantnag constituencies.Well if the ensuing Assembly poll in the 46 constituencies in the Kashmir valley records a polling percentage between 35 and 50 per cent it would denote two things. First,majority of people did not respond to the separatists'call for poll boycott. Secondly fair polling percentage would indicate peoples' desire to vote for change.
Apart from the vagaries of weather,which are expected to play a role in the Assembly poll which is to begin from November 25 and end by December 20,the recent floods and the widespread devastation caused in the valley could affect voter turn out.It seems that the Election Commission has been influenced by the views of majority of political parties.When the members of the Commission visited the state except for the National Conference all other major mainstream political parties,including the Congress, PDP, BJP and the BSP,favoured that Assembly poll should be held on time. These parties,including the Congress,were motivated by one factor in arguing in favour of holding the election on time.These parties believed that people were angry against the National Conference,which led the coalition Government, for misgovernance and for its failure to meet the challenges posed by the fury of floods and landslides in Jammu and Kashmir in which about 300 people lost their lives and several thousand families had lost their shelter. Peoples' anger against the NC and the Congress was reflected during the Lok Sabha election when both the parties failed to win even a single seat. Hence the PDP,the BJP and the Congress thought that if the election was held on time the NC could be mauled.Possibly leaders of the PDP,the Congress and the BJP did not realize that invariably the poll trends during the Lok Sabha election are reversed during the Assembly poll or the vice versa.
Yet another issue that merits top attention from the Government agencies is the need for tackling militants and for ensuring free and fair poll. Already agencies,including the Army and the ISI, across the LOC and the IB, are in the look out of opportunities for pushing groups of militants into Jammu and Kashmir for raising the level of violence.In fact the main cause behind repeated ceasefire violations by Pakistani troops on the LOC and on the IB in Jammu and Kashmir was to carve out a passage for militants to sneak into the state.These agencies wanted to equip militants,operating in the state,with sophisticated weapons and increase the man power so that the level of violence assumed alarming dimensions forcing people to remain indoors on the days of polling. They know that if the Kashmir valley records very poor polling Pakistan could raise the issue in international fora. This way the Union Home Ministry could make available more than 700 companies of paramilitary forces for ensuring incident free election in Jammu and Kashmir because the Centre has to look after the polling in Jharkhand state only.No doubt the 2008 Assembly election too was held in December but one is keen to know whether the BJP,which is keen to field party candidates in the Kashmir valley, is able to open its account in the valley. Hitherto,the BJP has not been able to win a single seat in Kashmir though it won 11 seats in the region of Jammu.Whatever may be the polling percentage one is interested in knowing whether people will vote for change for the status quo. |
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