Early Times Report
Jammu, Apr 3: Suspense continues over BJP candidate in the Anantnag-Rajouri-Poonch Lok Sabha constituency as the party is still discussing names of nominees.
Sources said that the decision of the National Conference to field Gujjar leader Mian Altaf in this seat has changed all equations and BJP is redevising its strategy to finalize the candidate.
As reported earlier, there were rumours in the political circle that the BJP was going to field a serving bureaucrat on the newly carved Anantnag-Rajouri seat.
Although the president of the J&K unit of the party, Ravinder Raina is also one of the contenders for this Parliamentary seat, the party was trying to convince some dynamic youth bureaucrat to join the electoral battle on BJP’s mandate.
The BJP is focussing on this Lok Sabha seat. It’s not known if the Indian National Congress will put forward its own candidate, support the National Conference for mutual support in other regions, or support the Peoples Democratic Party.
The stance of the Apni Party is also uncertain, whether they will have their own candidate or back another party or candidate.
The Peoples Democratic Party has decided to run in the elections, but it’s not decided if their president, Mehbooba Mufti, will be the candidate or someone else from th NC’s decision to field Gujjar leader Mian Altaf has changed all equations and BJP is redevising its strategy to finalize the candidate.
There were rumours in the political circle that the BJP was going to field a serving bureaucrat on the Anantnag-Rajouri seat.
The BJP president of the J&K unit Ravinder Raina is also one of the contenders.
The stance of the Apni Party is also uncertain, whether they will have their own candidate or back another party.
There’s also uncertainty about whether the Bharatiya Janata Party will nominate its own candidate or endorse someone else.
While the BJP seems to benefit from giving Scheduled Tribe status to the Paharis and reserving 9 seats for STs in the Jammu & Kashmir Assembly, there’s no clear data on how this decision affects others who feel that the Open Merit quota has been reduced from 50% to 30%.
After delimitation boundaries of all five Lok Sabha seats have changed, the entire Poonch district and areas of Rajouri district have become part of South Kashmir with the creation of the Anantnag-Rajouri Lok Sabha seat. This has assured parity in the Parliamentary seats with Jammu and Kashmir divisions having two and a half seats each.
The entire Poonch district and Rajouri, Nowshera, and Thanna Mandi Assembly constituencies of Rajouri
district are part of the Anantnag-Rajouri Parliamentary seat. Anantnag, Kulgam, and Shopian districts will be part of this seat from South Kashmir.
The Anantnag-Rajouri Lok Sabha Constituency comprises Assembly segments including Zainapura, Damhal Hanjipora, Kulgam, Devsar, Dooru, Larnoo, Anantnag West, Anantnag, Pahalgam, Nowshera, Rajouri, Darhal, Thanna Mandi, Surankote, Poonch and Mendhar |
