National Conference cuts Mehbooba no slack, fields LS candidate from her home seat

The NC has publicly maintained that it wants to contest all three Lok Sabha seats in the Kashmir Valley and its decision to stick to it places a question mark over the Peoples Alliance for the Gupkar Declaration (PAGD), an alliance of political parties in the Valley that was formed in 2020 to fight for the restoration of Jammu and Kashmir’s special status.

While the PDP has not formally announced Mehbooba’s candidature, she has been doing the rounds of Rajouri in the last few days. “The PDP as a party was looking for contesting elections as a unified force to present a united voice to 125 crore Indians about the situation in J&K. Unfortunately some of the constituents under compulsion have defied people’s wish and broke away from PAGD,” PDP spokesperson Mohit Bhan told The Indian Express, adding that the PDP would go solo with the support of like-minded people and organisations. “The political affairs committee mandated with the responsibility will take a call shortly on the list of candidates and other responsibilities related to the election process,” Bhat said.

Constituency make-up

The delimitation exercise completed in Jammu and Kashmir in May 2022 shifted the geographic boundaries and demographic composition of the Anantnag-Rajouri Lok Sabha seat that was earlier limited to the four districts of south Kashmir but now spans across the Pir Panjal into Poonch and Rajouri.

While the south Kashmir districts are dominated by Kashmiri Muslims, Poonch and Rajouri districts are largely populated by the Gujjar and Pahari communities. By fielding a prominent Gujjar religious leader such as Lahrvi, who is carrying forward a family legacy of politics and religion, the NC hopes to receive the community’s votes. The BJP — aiming to disrupt the traditional hold of Valley-based parties on this seat and make inroads in Kashmir — is hoping to benefit from the inclusion of the Gujjar-Bakerwal-dominated belts in the constituency coupled with the Centre’s move to extend Scheduled Tribe (ST) reservation to the Pahari community.

The constituency, earlier called the Anantnag parliamentary seat, was represented by Justice (retired) Hasnain Masoodi of the NC in the outgoing Lok Sabha. In 2019, he secured 32% of the votes, defeating G A Mir of the Congress by more than 6,000 votes. Mufti finished third after polling a little more than 30,000 votes. Earlier, Omar had said that the NC would not make room for a party that came third in the last election and give away a seat it currently holds.

In 2014, Mehbooba Mufti had a vote share of 53%. She defeated the NC’s Mirza Mehboob Beig by more than 65,000 votes. Beig is in the PDP at present.