Despite its malicious strategy of communal gerrymandering to win the Legslative Assembly elections in Indian administered Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), the right-wing Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) was rejected by a thumping majority.
Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI(M)) candidate, Yusuf Tarigami, retained his seat for a fifth time, defeating a Jamaat-e-Islami rival. An alliance of the Jammu and Kashmir National Conference (NC) and the Indian National Congress (INC) won a simple majority (42 and 6 seats, respectively) in the 90-seat assembly. The NC is a J&K-based party with a long history.
Out of seven independents elected, four have announced they will join the NC. Tarigami is also supporting the NC. Another two NC members, who ran as independents after they were refused endorsement by the NC, may also join. With the independents, the NC-led alliance would command a majority of 53.
The BJP won 29 seats (25% of the vote), but won the largest popular vote share.
Jammu is a Hindu-majority region with pockets of Muslim population, while Kashmir is Muslim-majority with Hindu, Sikh and other religious minorities.
The BJP’s vote share is largely Jammu-based. The NC’s victory is due largely to the campaign to reinstate special status to J&K, enshrined in Article 370 of the Indian Constitution.
Article 370 along with Article 35A, were revoked by the BJP government on August 5, 2019, removing J&K’s special status. Consequently, J&K was divided into two separate “Union Territories” administered by New Delhi. One territory, J&K was given the right to a Legislative Assembly while the other, Ladakh, was not.
Importantly, J&K has been divided between India and Pakistan since October 1947. At the time of independence, the princely ruler of Jammu-Kashmir Hari Singh decided to stay independent instead of ceding either to India or Pakistan, particularly frustrating the latter. Pakistan occupied parts of Jammu-Kashmir through armed proxies dispatched from Pakistani tribal areas. Hari Singh, unable to withstand the Pakistani onslaught, sought Indian intervention. While the Indian military was quick to intervene and halted the Pakistani advance, New Delhi has refused to withdraw its military ever since.
The previous J&K elections were held in 2014, resulting in a coalition government of the Kashmir-based People's Democratic Party (PDP) and the BJP. Instead of completing its six-year term, the coalition ended in 2018, when the BJP parted ways with the PDP. Since August 2019, when Kashmir erupted in protest, the region’s administration has been entrusted to a lieutenant-governor.
The BJP strategy to control J&K
Restive since 1947, the Indian-held J&K turned to militancy in the late-1980s. Two factors, during the course of the 1990s, shaped the conflict. While Pakistan willingly and happily armed militant groups fighting back against India, Pakistan also globalised the “jihad” there. This contributed to the marginalisation of secular trends leading the freedom struggle until the 1980s.
New Delhi, preferring a jihadist opposition to a secular one, also encouraged puritan grouplets. For the BJP, pacifying J&K is an important “show of strength” to its fanatic social-base and middle-class vote bank in greater India.
Before taking power in 2014, the BJP, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, promised to rescind Article 370. On winning the elections for a second time in 2019, Modi hurriedly moved to abrogate Article 370.
Modi consistently claimed that J&K’s special status was an obstacle to its development, in addition to contributing to an armed rebellion and a movement for secession.
After the abolition of J&K’s special status in 2019, steps were first taken to settle Indian citizens in the region. More than 12,000 residencies were issued. Previously, under Article 370, Indian citizens could not be domiciled in J&K, a situation J&K guarded since 1947, as it feared that India (and Pakistan) could turn J&K’s indigenous population into a minority through settlements.
The BJP’s next step was to raise the number of seats in the Legislative Assembly and gerrymander the region in favour of its Hindutva agenda. Seven seats were added to the Legislative Assembly: Six seats were added to the Jammu region (rising from 37 to 43), while the Muslim-majority Kashmir region got only one (46 to 47).
Notably, Kashmir has a larger population than Jammu (56.15% of citizens reside in Kashmir and 43.85% in Jammu).
Meanwhile, the number of Hindu-majority constituencies in Jammu rose from 24 to 31 and the number of Muslim-majority constituencies fell from 12 to 9.
Courtesy of the BJP's “Hindutvised” gerrymandering, the 28% Hindu population in J&K was granted 34.44% of the overall seats.
Five seats were also reserved in the Legislative Assembly (two each for women and Kashmiri Pandits, and one for Hindu migrants from Pakistan). However, candidates for the reserved seats are not elected, but will be nominated by the administrator, Lieutenant-Governor Manoj Sinha. These undemocratically nominated members will have the same rights as directly elected MLAs. However, even these five additional seats will not rescue the BJP this time.
Results
Voters undermined all of the BJP’s strategies and despite having the power (via the administrator) to nominate five MLAs, its plan to appoint a “Hindu Chief Minister” for the region has fallen flat.
The detailed results were: NC 42 seats; BJP 29 seats; INC 6 seats; Jammu and Kashmir People’s Democratic Party (PDP — a BJP ally) 3 seats; CPI(M) 1 seat; Peoples Conference 1 seat; Aam Admi Party (Common Man’s Party) 1 seat; Independents 7 seats.
Apart from winning the most individual votes, the BJP received votes in Kashmir for the first time, but did not win a seat. BJP ally, the PDP, suffered a crushing defeat. Its share fell to 3 seats, down from 28 previously.
The NC was the only party to field Muslim and Hindu candidates.
According to election analysts, the INC focused on canvassing in Kashmir instead of Jammu. It won 5 seats in Kashmir and 1 in Jammu. The NC criticised this strategy, saying that if the INC had focussed on Jammu and left Kashmir to the NC, it could have added to the alliance’s overall vote tally. The NC won 35 mandates from Kashmir, 7 from Jammu.
With the independents joining the NC, the party’s tally in Jammu will improve.
All-powerful New Delhi
The NC and its allies won on the promise of restoring Article 370, restoring the state’s identity and providing a dignified life to its people.
Particularly in Kashmir, voters rejected the BJP’s actions over the past five years. However, the new J&K government will be at the mercy of New Delhi.
Since the approval of the 2019 “Jammu and Kashmir Reorganization Bill” and the 2023 “Jammu and Kashmir Reorganization Amendment Bill”, the J&K Legislative Assembly has been deprived of the powers enjoyed by the assemblies of other Union Territories.
The police, bureaucracy, attorney general and prosecutor are controlled by the Lieutenant-Governor nominated by the BJP rulers in New Delhi. All matters related to appointments and transfers will be approved by the L-G. Likewise, financial decision-making will also require the L-G’s nod. A representative of the L-G will attend all Cabinet meetings. Above all, legislation will be subject to his approval.
Thus, in practice the J&K government has been reduced to the status of a municipality. The newly-elected government will be crippled.
In practice, the rule of the L-G, and through him the BJP central government, will continue for the foreseeable future.
Though BJP's Hindutva agenda has been defeated for now, the goal of achieving democratic, economic and political freedoms requires a long struggle.
As a result of the BJP's poisonous politics, the regional divide between Jammu and Kashmir is compounding. Only a secular, socialist agenda can bridge the gap between the two regions and ultimately bring about the unification of the four regions now administered between India and Pakistan.