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Elections to panchayats, urban local bodies and the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly will likely be conducted only after the general elections, set to be held after a few months this year.
After towns and cities, the rural areas in Jammu and Kashmir will cease to have the traditional grassroots-level elected representatives as the five-year term of 4,892 elected village panchayats came to an end Tuesday.
A new governance structure — District Development Councils, elected directly by people — however, continues to be in place since the standalone elections held in 2020.
Just about two months ago, the term of urban local bodies, including two municipal corporations, 19 municipal councils and 57 municipal committees, ended on November 14, 2023. These were constituted through elections held on party symbols after 13 years.
According to sources in the government, elections to urban local bodies and panchayats are unlikely before the Lok Sabha elections, although the J&K Administrative Council had, on December 28, 2023, amended the J&K Panchayati Raj Act that allows Other Backward Class (OBC) reservation in urban and rural local bodies.
“The State Election Commission could not have extended OBC reservation to J&K since there was no such provision. Therefore there was a constitutional issue in conducting these polls,” a top source told The Indian Express. With the passing of the Jammu and Kashmir Reservation (Amendment Bill), 2023 in the Winter Session of Parliament, “the OBC reservation can now be provided for elections in J&K”, the source explained.
However, two issues that come in the way of holding local body and panchayat elections immediately, according to government sources, are: identification of municipal constituencies to be reserved, and the transfer of mandate to conduct the municipal electoral processes to the State Election Commission from the Chief Electoral Officer now, in accordance with Constitutional provisions.
Further, elections to the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly need not be held along with the Lok Sabha polls, the sources said, citing the Supreme Court deadline of September 2024 for the same while delivering its judgment on the Constitutional validity of the J&K Reorganisation Act, 2019. The last Assembly elections in J&K, were held in 2014.
Sources said it would take time to mobilise election workers, EVMs and security personnel by September after completing the Lok Sabha formalities. It is learnt that the Election Commission is likely to assess the logistics and security arrangements required for holding the polls when it visits J&K as a part of its Lok Sabha polls review.
The EC has, this week, started visits to all states and UTs for Lok Sabha polls, with Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh. It is yet to announce when it will travel to J&K.
Members of district development councils, a new layer of elected representatives in J&K, are the only connection between the J&K government and people now. But they cannot replace panchayat members, councillors or MLAs in their functions.
Meanwhile, State Election Commissioner B R Sharma announced that the special summary revision of electoral rolls of Panchayat elections for enrolment of voters who turned 18 years by January 1, 2024, and also for correction in details of already enrolled voters, will be held from January 15 to February 5. The Commission will publish the final electoral rolls for panchayats on February 26.
Along with the 4,892 village panchayats, the term of chairpersons of 316 block development councils (BDCs), whose elections were held in October 2019, too have ended — these being co-terminous with the panchayats, officials said.
Elections to 4,490 panchayats comprising an equal number of sarpanch and 35,096 panch were held on non-party basis in November-December 2018, while maiden BDC elections were held in October 2019 after a period of seven years. The elected sarpanch were members of the BDCs in their respective blocks and they had elected the council chairpersons.
