The sudden release of Awami Ittehad Party leader Engineer Rashid has stirred things up in the Valley. It is as if a big rock has been hurled into the already choppy waters of Kashmir politics. The ripples generated from the impact are set to radiate outwards. Rashid’s combative press conference at Delhi Press Club has already set the ball rolling. It remains to be seen how he is welcomed back into the Valley and how he himself chooses to go about it. If anything, Rashid has always been a maverick and consequently his politics has been dramatic and unpredictable. With his entry, the ongoing election campaign will become only more interesting.
The campaign is already heating up. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to visit Jammu and Kashmir twice this month to campaign for BJP candidates ahead of the assembly elections. His first visit is set for September 14, with a second visit planned for September 19. Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, who addressed a rally at Anantnag on Wednesday, announced five guarantees, if the Congress-NC alliance is voted to power in the Union territory. The guarantees include interest-free loans of Rs 500,000 for women entrepreneurs, Rs 25 lakh health insurance for each household, Rs 3,000 monthly for women heads of families, 11 kg of grains per person through the public distribution system, and the fulfillment of the rehabilitation promise for Kashmiri Pandit migrants made during Manmohan Singh’s tenure.
Other parties in the Valley including the National Conference (NC) and the PDP are also expected to up their game. They face a challenging road ahead. The ongoing Assembly polls are the first major electoral exercise in which the old and the new political order are face to face. The outcome will profoundly impact Kashmir’s future politics. Though the NC looks strong on paper and Mehbooba Mufti remains politically very much relevant, the parties have a work on hand to retain their centrality. This has become critical after the alliances they were a part of have now decisively come undone.
The PDP has traditionally been dominant in South Kashmir and the NC in central Kashmir with Srinagar city as its core base. And in the north we are witnessing the dramatic emergence of Engineer Rashid’s party as a significant player. Whether this new political reality also reflects in the seat tallies of these parties in the future assembly election remains to be seen. For now, the election campaign is becoming more exciting by the day. The coming weeks are set to be packed with a high voltage political drama. Here’s hoping that the campaign remains peaceful and the outcome benefits people of the union territory. More so, after what they have gone through over the past five years.
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