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Journalism of Courage
In a notification, the Election Commission (EC) said on Thursday that Kashmiri Pandit migrants staying in Jammu and Udhampur districts need not fill the “Form M” for casting their votes in their native parliamentary constituencies in the Valley. The EC said they would now be “mapped” with special polling stations to be set up in the zones that they are residing in currently.
It was introduced during the 1996 J&K Assembly elections to enable Kashmiri Pandit migrants to vote in their constituencies in the Valley even while staying in exile. The form is filled by the heads of Kashmiri Pandit migrant families staying at different places in Jammu and elsewhere in the country.
After the announcement of any Assembly or Lok Sabha elections, the eligible migrant voter could collect the “Form M” from the office of Relief Commissioner or their respective zonal officer, fill it, and get it signed by a gazetted officer. They were required to affix their photographs and declare their native place in the Valley before migration and also mention the details of adult members in their families who were eligible as voters.
After the outbreak of militancy in Kashmir in 1989, thousands of Kashmiri Pandit families left their native places in Kashmir and migrated to safer places in Jammu and other locations.
However, even after their migration, they continued to register themselves as voters in their native places in the Valley, hoping to return there in the event of a favourable situation.
As these migrants were from different places in the Valley, the EC introduced “Form M” to identify them area-wise, enabling them to cast a vote for their native constituencies from the places they were residing in.
Yes. Kashmiri Pandit migrants have long been pressing for simplification of their voting process. Even after filling the “Form M”, there was no guarantee that they could cast a vote on the polling day in the absence of any intimation about the acceptance or rejection of the form well in advance. There have also been instances when a migrant staying in one zone was listed as a voter at a polling station set up in another zone.
These issues have reflected in the number of Kashmiri Pandit migrants availing this facility. During the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, only 13,537 of the total nearly one lakh migrant voters had cast their vote.
The EC has now begun mapping Kashmiri Pandit migrant voters in Jammu and Udhampur districts and said it would set up special polling stations falling in their zones. According to the new scheme, separate constituency-wise voter lists will be issued for migrant voters residing in each zone so that they cast their vote at the polling booth set up there on polling day for their respective constituencies.
A total of 1.13 lakh Kashmiri Pandit migrant voters have been registered in three Lok Sabha constituencies of Kashmir – Srinagar, Anantnag and Baramulla. With these constituencies registering less than 20% polling during the 2019 elections, these Kashmiri Pandit migrant voters can be a decisive factor in the elections. Last time, more than 80% of the migrant votes are estimated to have gone to the BJP.
Kashmiri Pandit migrants staying in Delhi and elsewhere in the country, who are lesser in numbers, will still be required to fill up the “Form M”. However, the EC has also eased the process of filling up these forms by allowing self-attestation instead of the earlier required certification by gazetted officers.
