As BJP makes its moves, can Rahul save the INDIA bloc in Kashmir?

Sources said that Congress general secretary Mukul Wasnik has requested the NC and PDP leaders to wait for a meeting with Rahul in Delhi, before taking any step. On Tuesday, Rahul entered Maharashtra, in the final leg of his Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra.

The NC has laid claim to the Kashmir seats – Srinagar, Baramulla and Anantnag – on the grounds that it won all three in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. “If the NC wins (these seats) again, it will win them for the INDIA bloc. So what is the problem?” NC president Farooq Abdullah told mediapersons last week.

The sitting MPs of the Kashmir seats currently are Farooq Abdullah, Srinagar; Hasnain Masoodi, Anantnag; and Mohammad Akbar Lone, Baramulla. While Abdullah had won against the PDP’s Aga Syed Mohsin by a little over 70,000 votes in 2019, Masoodi (a retired high court judge) had defeated PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti by 9,656 votes, and Lone had won against the J&K Peoples Conference candidate by over 30,000 votes.

The PDP was relegated to third place in both Anantnag and Baramulla, with the NC pointing out that Mehbooba herself got fewer votes than the Congress’s Ghulam Ahmad Mir.

2019 or 2014 as a benchmark?

The PDP believes the 2019 results should not be the right marker for the respective strengths of the parties, as the elections had come a year after the collapse of the PDP-BJP government in the state, with public anger running high against the two parties.

After the abrogation of Article 370, the PDP believes, the anger is restricted to the BJP, and people have forgiven its misjudged alliance with the central party. It also points to the 2014 Lok Sabha results to make its case for the coming elections.

In the general elections that year, it was the PDP that had won all the three Kashmir seats. Farooq – arguably Kashmir’s tallest political leader – lost from Srinagar to the PDP’s Tariq Hameed Karra by 42,280 votes; Mehbooba defeated the NC’s Mirza Mehbooba Beg in Anantnag by 65,417 votes; while in Baramulla, the PDP’s Muzaffar Hussain Baig defeated the NC’s Sharief-ud-din Shariq by 29,219 votes.

However, Karra is now with the Congress, while Muzaffar Baig recently disassociated himself from the PDP and was present at the Jammu rally of Prime Minister Narendra Modi earlier this month.

While the BJP is already in a strong position in Jammu following the abrogation of Article 370 – the party had won both the seats in the province in 2019 as well – the Congress fears that the BJP will also snatch Anantnag in Kashmir if the NC-PDP tension continues.

It would mark a huge psychological victory for the BJP as well, being its first ever victory in Kashmir.

Delimitation and after

What has boosted the BJP’s chances in Anantnag is the refiguration of the constituency following the 2022 delimitation, adding to it several segments from Jammu province with a high number of Gujjars and Bakerwals. The two ST communities are favourably inclined towards the Modi government, for providing political reservation to STs for the first time in J&K, as well as for extending them safeguards under the Forest Rights Act – both becoming possible following the scrapping of J&K’s special status.

Additionally, last month, the Modi government passed an Act extending ST status to the Paharis, which may prove crucial in the Anantnag and Baramulla seats. Since then, several prominent Pahari leaders have joined the BJP.

Following delimitation, barring the Sunderbani-Kalakote Assembly segment, the entire Poonch and Rajouri districts of Jammu province – with their population of Gujjars, Bakerwals and Paharis – are now part of the Anantnag Lok Sabha constituency.

In 2014, the last state polls held in J&K, of the four Assembly constituencies in Rajouri district, two (Rajouri and Darhal) had gone to the PDP and the other two (Nowshera and Kalakote) to the BJP.

Of the three Assembly constituencies in Poonch district, one each was won by the PDP, NC and Congress.

The emergence of smaller political parties such as the Democratic Progressive Azad Party of former Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad, and the J&K Apni Party is also likely to hurt the NC and PDP, with these marginal outfits seen as possible partners of the BJP.

Post the re-configuration of the Srinagar and Baramulla Lok Sabha seats, the hold of the NC and PDP on their erstwhile strongholds is also diluted. Srinagar now includes areas of Pulwama and Shopian districts, where the PDP holds sizeable influence; while areas like Beerwah and Budgam that were earlier in Srinagar and are seen as NC strongholds are now part of Baramulla.

All this gives an outside chance to smaller players like the Peoples Conference of Sajad Lone.

The NC is also struggling against the lack of a good candidate in Baramulla, with one potential name, Aga Roohullah, having acceptability in Shia-dominated parts but on the sidelines since Article 370 abrogation.

The equations in the three Kashmir seats can also change in case of a high voter turnout. One of the major reasons for Mehbooba’s loss in 2019 was the poll boycott called in South Kashmir at the time. Anantnag saw its polling drop to just 8.96%, from 60.7% in 2014. Srinagar and Baramulla also saw low polling amidst anger against the PDP and Centre, seeing 14% and 34% turnout, respectively.

Factors for, and against an alliance

The profitability of the NC and PDP staying together was evident during J&K’s maiden District Development Council elections in 2020, its first since the abrogation of Article 370. The NC and PDP had fought the polls as part of the People’s Alliance for Gupkar Declaration, and won 110 seats together. The BJP, though, was the single-largest party, getting 75 seats.

The Congress won 26 seats, the Apni Party 12, and the Independents 50.

NC leaders argue that the PDP, however, is no longer the force it used to be, as it continues to face anger over its alliance with the BJP and has lost a string of leaders recently. A weak PDP suits the NC, leaving the field open for it in Kashmir.

Sources say there is another reason behind the NC’s stand – its apprehension of being overshadowed by Mehbooba in Parliament as the more vehement J&K Opposition face. The PDP chief is known to have opposed her late father’s decision to align with the BJP to form the government in J&K after 2014, and since the government fell, has been the most vocal voice against the BJP.

The NC, in contrast, is seen as more ambivalent towards the BJP. Omar said recently that the NDA could achieve its 370-plus seat target given the state of the Opposition.

For the PDP though, ceding all three Kashmir seats to the NC will be political suicide at a time that it is fighting for relevance.