While the BJP won its best-ever tally of 29 seats, it fell short of the intended target of 35 from the Jammu region
With the National Conference (NC)-Congress alliance upsetting the applecart of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Jammu and Kashmir, the saffron party has gone into self-introspection mode.
While the BJP won its best-ever tally of 29 seats, it fell short of the intended target of 35 from the Jammu region. The party had planned to muster 15 seats from Kashmir including some independents and like-minded parties in hopes of forming a government. However, its plan did not take off as the saffron party got just one seat out of a total of 10 from the Muslim majority Ramban, Rajouri and Poonch districts.
The party had been heavily banking upon Gujjar, Bakarwal and Pahari voters to propel it to the tally of 35 seats out of a total of 43 in Jammu region.
Reacting to the results, former deputy chief minister (CM) Kavinder Gupta said, “The people of Jammu supported us and we thank them. We had intended for 35 seats but fell short of it by few. These are all calculations but still we emerged as a big party and BJP would keep working for the development, peace and stability in Jammu and Kashmir.”
Ram Madhav, BJP’s election in-charge for Kashmir, said, “The BJP won 29 seats in Jammu, an all time high and we had over 25% vote, which is also highest. However, the NC-Congress alliance got the numbers. The Congress piggybacked for the NC but it was squarely rejected in Jammu. They got only one seat in Jammu. We will play the role of an effective opposition. Certainly, we will analyse the results.”
BJP’s local unit president Ravinder Raina, who lost from his turf of Nowshera to NC’s Surinder Choudhary, also saw the silver lining, saying, “The BJP delivered its best performance in J&K with 29 seats, which is the highest record. We express our gratitude to the people of Jammu and Kashmir, especially of Jammu.”
“While BJP swept Jammu region and workers also hoped that the party would win the Nowshera seat but it didn’t happen and we feel sad but the BJP polled over 27,000 votes,” he added.
Addressing the party’s dismal performance in Kashmir, he said, “We tried to do well in Gurez, Karnah, Bandipora, Shopian Habbakadal and Anantnag West. The party had secured good votes but couldn’t convert them into wins.”
He also blamed the Independents and other like-minded parties faltering as a factor for the opposition parties getting the mandate. He, however, asserted that 29 BJP MLAs will forcefully raise the issues of the people in the House.
In August 2019, the BJP government had abrogated Article 370 and abolished the special status of Jammu and Kashmir converting it into a union territory. Farooq Abdullah’s National Conference and Mehbooba Mufti’s PDP had called the abrogation an “attack on Kashmiri identity”. These parties had described the move as anti-Kashmir. Notably, a large population in Jammu was also against the removal of Article 370.
In the BJP’s “Naya Kashmir”, more emphasis was given on security and continual operations were launched against terrorism, separatism and stone pelting. However, the sympathisers of the separatist sentiment called the moves an attack on freedom of expression.__Courtesy Kashmir
