In the second phase of the Jammu and Kashmir assembly elections, voting will be held today on 26 assembly seats in 6 districts. In which 25.78 lakh voters will be able to cast their vote.
Out of the 26 seats in the second phase, 15 seats are from Central Kashmir and 11 from Jammu. According to the Election Commission, 239 candidates are in the fray in the second phase. Out of which 233 are male and 6 are female.
In the second phase, 131 candidates are millionaires and 49 have criminal cases registered against them. Jammu and Kashmir BJP president Ravinder Raina has declared his assets to be only Rs 1,000.
Former Chief Minister and National Conference Vice President Omar Abdullah is contesting from Ganderbal and Birwah. Omar lost in the Lok Sabha elections from Baramulla seat to Rashid, an engineer who contested from Tihar Jail. This time also jailed surgeon Ahmed Wage alias Azadi Chacha is contesting from Ganderbal seat against him.
In the first phase, voting was held for 24 assembly seats in 7 districts on September 18. Meanwhile, 61.38% voting took place. The highest voter turnout was 80.20% in Kishtwar and the lowest was 46.99% in Pulwama.
Highest turnout in 8 seats in Srinagar, PDP fielded candidates in all seats In the second phase maximum 8 seats are in Srinagar and least 2 seats are in Ganderbal district. Apart from this, 5 seats each of Budgam and Rajouri and 3 seats each of Reasi and Poonch will be voted. Ganderbal, Srinagar, Budgam in Srinagar division and Reasi, Rajouri and Poonch in Jammu division. Maximum 16 candidates are in fray for Srinagar's Habbakadal seat. While there is a fight between 4 candidates in Budhal of Rajouri.
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is contesting all 26 seats in this phase. The National Conference, which is contesting the elections in alliance, has fielded candidates on 20 seats while the Congress has fielded candidates on 6 seats. BJP has 17 candidates while 98 independent candidates are in the fray. In the second phase, 93 candidates are in the fray in Srinagar district. After this, 46 candidates are contesting in Budgam, 34 in Rajouri, 25 in Poonch, 21 in Ganderbal and 20 in Riasi.
All 6 Congress candidates are millionaires, BJP President's wealth is only Rs 1000 The Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) has prepared a report based on the affidavits of 238 candidates of the second phase of the Jammu and Kashmir assembly elections. According to the ADR report, the average wealth of the 238 candidates in the second phase is Rs 5.80 crore.
Out of 238, 55% i.e. 131 candidates are millionaires. He has assets of one crore or more. All the 6 candidates of the Congress party are millionaires, with an average wealth of Rs 29.39 crore. At the same time, 19 of the 26 candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) are millionaires.
Jammu and Kashmir Up Party candidate Syed Mohammad Altaf Bukhari has the highest wealth of Rs 165 crore and independent candidate Mohammad Akram has the lowest wealth of Rs 500 crore. Apart from this, Jammu and Kashmir BJP president Ravinder Raina has declared his assets to be only Rs 1,000.
Criminal cases registered against 49 candidates, 8 red alert seats According to the ADR report, out of the 238 candidates of the second phase, 21% i.e. 49 candidates have criminal cases registered against them. 16% i.e. 37 candidates have serious cases like murder, kidnapping registered against them. There are cases of attempted murder against 3 candidates. Cases of crimes against women have been registered against 7 candidates. A case of rape under Section 376 of the IPC has also been registered against one of them.
There are 8 red alert seats out of 26 in the second phase. A red alert seat is one where 3 or more candidates have criminal cases registered against them. The 8 seats include Habbakdal, Idgah, Budgam, Ganderbal, Kalakot-Sundarbani, Birwah, Jadibal and Khansaheb.
5 hot seats in second phase
1. Ganderbal
The Ganderbal Assembly has been the stronghold of the Abdullah family. This time National Conference Vice President and former Chief Minister Omar Abdullah is contesting from Ganderbal seat. His grandfather Sheikh Abdullah won elections from the seat in 1977 and father Farooq Abdullah in 1983, 1987 and 1996. However, the National Conference lost this seat in 2002. Omar Abdullah won this seat in 2008 elections. After this he also became the Chief Minister. In 2014 Assembly, Sheikh Ishfaq Jabbar won from Ganderbal seat on National Conference ticket.
15 candidates are in fray for Ganderbal seat. However, Omar Abdullah is facing competition from Jammu and Kashmir People's Democratic Party (JKPDP)'s Bashir Ahmed Mir and Jammu and Kashmir United Movement's Sheikh Ishfaq Jabbar, who was an MLA on a National Conference ticket in 2014. BJP has not fielded any candidate from here. Jammu and Kashmir Apni Party (JKAP) Qazi Mubishar Farooq and Democratic Progressive Azad Party (DPAP) leader Qaiser Sultan Ghani are contesting from the Ganderbal seat.
Apart from this, Abdullah is also facing Ahmed Wage alias Surjan Barkati, known as Azadi Chacha in Kashmir Valley. Barkati is currently in jail. He is accused of inciting youth to join terrorist organizations by giving inflammatory speeches after the death of Barkati Wurhan Wani. Earlier, Umar had lost the Lok Sabha election from Baramula to Engineer Rashid, who had contested from Tihar Jail. Sheikh Ashiq is contesting from Engineer Rashid's Awami Ittehad party. After the NC-Congress alliance, Ganderbal District Congress President Sahil Farooq has announced to contest as an independent.
2. Budgam
The National Conference (NC) dominates the Budgam assembly seat that came into being in 1962. This has happened only once in the last 10 assembly elections when the NC faced defeat. Ali Mohammad Mir of Congress won from here in 1972 assembly elections. In such a situation, Budgam is being called a safe seat for Omar.
There are 8 candidates in the fray for this seat, but the main contest is between Omar Abdullah and JKPDP candidate Agha Syed Muntajir Mehdi. Agha Syed Muntajir is the son of prominent Shia cleric and Hurriyat leader Agha Syed Hasan Mosavi. The Aga family is one of the three prominent Shia clerical families of Kashmir. Mosavi has religious and political influence in Budgam district of Kashmir. Between 30,000 and 33,000 voters in the Budgam assembly are Shias, about 35 percent of the district's population.
Earlier the seat was represented by Mehdi's cousin Aga Syed Ruhullah who was elected to Parliament from Srinagar in the Lok Sabha elections. In the 2014 assembly elections, National Conference candidate Agha Syed Ruhullah Mehdi won from Budgam seat.
3. Nowshera
The Nowshera Assembly has traditionally been a Congress stronghold. After coming into existence in 1962, the Congress won the seat eight consecutive times till 2002, but lost the seat to the National Conference in the 2008 elections. This time BJP has once again given ticket to Jammu and Kashmir state president Ravinder Raina on Nowshera seat. He faces a challenge from then PDP candidate Surendra Chaudhary, who gave him a tough fight in the 2014 elections, who is contesting on a JKNC ticket this time. While PDP has given ticket to Advocate Haque Nawaz Chaudhary.
In the 2014 Jammu and Kashmir Assembly elections, BJP candidate Ravinder Raina won the Nowshera seat by a margin of 9,503 votes. He defeated the then PDP candidate Surendra Chaudhary.
4. Budhal
There is an uncle-nephew contest on the Budhal assembly seat in Rajouri district in Pir Panjal area of Jammu. This assembly seat has been constituted after delimitation. BJP has given ticket to former minister Chaudhary Zulfiqar Ali from this seat. The National Conference has fielded Javed Iqbal Chaudhary against him. Javed is the son of Zulfkar's real elder sister. He won the Block Development Council (BDC) election from Kotranka block and has been the BDC chairman. Javed, an independent political leader along with his wife, joined the National Conference in August 2024.
On the other hand, Jammu and Kashmir Upani Party vice-president Chaudhry Zulfkar joined the BJP after meeting Home Minister Amit Shah in Delhi before the announcement of candidates' names. Zulfkar Ali is a lawyer by profession. He contested the 2008 and 2014 assembly elections on a PDP ticket from Darhal assembly constituency in Rajouri district. They won both the elections. From 2015 to 2018, he was also a cabinet minister in the Mehbooba Mufti-led PDP-BJP coalition government. But this coalition government fell in June 2018 after BJP came out of the coalition government. After this, under the leadership of former minister Altaf Bukhari, many PDP leaders founded their party JKAP i.e. Jammu and Kashmir in the year 2020.
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has given a chance to a young face Guftar Ahmed Chaudhary from here. Only four candidates are in the fray from Budhal assembly constituency and the fourth candidate is Abdul Rashid of Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP).
5. Srimata Vaishno Devi
Srimata Vaishnodevi area was earlier a part of Jammu's Riasi assembly seat. After delimitation in 2022, the new seat became Srimata Vaishno Devi. The BJP won the 2014 and 2008 assembly elections as a part of Riasi.
Elections are going to be held for the first time on this seat. BJP, which has won the last two assembly elections from Reasi, has fielded Baldev Raj Sharma as its candidate. Although the party had earlier fielded Riasi district president Rohit Dubey as its candidate, it withdrew his name after a few hours. Congress candidate is Bhupendra Singh. Jugal Kishor, who was the Congress candidate in the last two assembly elections, is contesting as an independent this time. There are about 15 thousand Baridar voters in this seat. Baridar Sangharsh Samiti has fielded its president Shyam Singh as an independent. It is the smallest seat in terms of electorate in Jammu. There are a total of 55,618 voters here.
How different will the 2024 Jammu and Kashmir assembly elections be from 2014?
- Article 370 was removed on 5 August 2019. Assembly elections are being held here for the first time after Jammu and Kashmir became a union territory.
- The last time elections were held in 2014 for 87 assembly seats, out of which 4 seats were from Ladakh. 7 Assembly seats increased after becoming a union territory. So this time elections are being held on 90 seats.
- Of the 90 assembly seats in Jammu and Kashmir, 74 are reserved for general, 7 for SC and 9 for ST.
- Being a special state, before the removal of Article 370, the tenure of the Jammu and Kashmir government was 6 years, but now it will be only 5 years.
Polling in 90 seats in 3 phases Voting on 90 assembly seats of Jammu and Kashmir is scheduled to be held in three phases on September 18, September 25 and October 1. The majority figure is 46. The result will be declared on October 8. In fact, assembly elections are being held in Jammu and Kashmir after 10 years. In the 2014 elections, PDP got maximum 28 seats and BJP got 25 seats. Both the parties formed the government together.
Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly has 87 lakh voters and more than 11 thousand booths According to Chief Election Commissioner Rajeev Kumar, there are 87 lakh 9 thousand voters in Jammu and Kashmir. 11838 polling booths will be constructed for the assembly elections. An average of 735 voters will vote at each booth. Special arrangements have been made for women and disabled persons. And 360 model polling stations will be constructed.
The last assembly elections were held in 2014 Assembly elections were last held in Jammu and Kashmir in 2014. Then BJP and PDP formed a coalition government. In 2018, the government fell after the coalition broke down. After this, the state had Governor's rule (as per the then Jammu and Kashmir Constitution) for 6 months. After this President's rule was implemented.
The 2019 Lok Sabha elections were held during the President's rule, with the BJP returning to the center with an overwhelming majority. Following this, on August 5, 2019, the BJP government abrogated Article 370 and divided the state into two Union Territories (Jammu-Kashmir and Ladakh). In this way, assembly elections are being held in Jammu and Kashmir after 10 years.
90 seats in Jammu and Kashmir, 7 added to delimitation Jammu and Kashmir had 87 seats in the 2014 assembly elections. Out of which 4 were from Ladakh. After the separation of Ladakh, 83 seats were left. Later 7 new seats were added after delimitation. 6 of them are in Jammu and 1 in Kashmir. Now elections will be held on a total of 90 seats. Out of which 43 are in Jammu and 47 in Kashmir division. 7 seats are reserved for SC (Scheduled Caste) and 9 seats for ST (Scheduled Tribe).
Jammu and Kashmir Lok Sabha Election Results The Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir has five Lok Sabha seats. In the 2024 elections, National Conference and BJP won 2 seats each, while independent engineer Rashid won one seat.
Image Credit: (Divya-Bhaskar): Images/graphics belong to (Divya-Bhaskar).
