A dark comedy

The ongoing phase-wise civic polls in Jammu and Kashmir are unique, even in the eyes of the Indian security personnel on polling duty. Ramesh Kumar of the paramilitary Central Reserve Police Force was puzzled by the absence of people. He told the leading daily, Greater Kashmir, that the deserted polling booth he was manning was a rare sight. “It is for the first time I am seeing polling staff sitting idle and enjoying [their] tea. They’ve nothing else to do”.

The first two phases of the elections – on Monday and Wednesday – were uniquely strange in that there were hardly any candidates contesting. Nobody knew about the candidates contesting in their constituency or the location of the polling centres. On Wednesday, our town, Bijbehara, went to the polls, but no one had any inkling about who most of the candidates were or where polling booths were situated. I inquired about this from almost a dozen people in my neighbourhood. But everyone feigned dismissive ignorance.

The day was uneventful owing to the stated timing of the polling. It commenced at 6am – half an hour before sunrise – perhaps earning a unique distinction in the history of the evolution of democracy. A day before the polls, the timing of the election was rescheduled to start an hour earlier without any explanation from the authorities.

Omar Abdullah, former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister and working president of the pro-India National Conference (NC), hinted that the move might be informed by a malign intent. “Why are polling booths open at 6am? If I believed conspiracy theories, I’d believe it’s because journalists won’t be around to verify the genuineness of voters at that very early hour,” he tweeted.

Uncontested blessings: The two main pro-India parties, the NC and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), have boycotted the polls, as has the All-Parties Hurriyat Conference, a pro-freedom political conglomerate, over the Indian government’s intention to scrap Article 35-A of the Indian constitution that affords a special status to the volatile province and bars outsiders from purchasing land and domiciles.

The boycott has left the field wide open for the BJP and a few other contestants to afford some technical legitimacy to an otherwise apparent charade. Altaf Thakur, the BJP state spokesperson, recently claimed that the party won 84 municipal wards uncontested across Kashmir.

A National Conference spokesperson accused Jammu and Kashmir Governor Satya Pal Malik of “playing a partisan role in the state” and implementing the right-wing Hindutva agenda. A statement by the NC likened the current governor’s time with that of the erstwhile prime minister-turned-chief-minister of Jammu and Kashmir Ghulam Muhammad Sadiq “during which the candidates were selected rather than being elected”.

The NC said that “the whole process of elections is a smokescreen”, claiming that the selections were already been done by the governor’s office. The charge sounded quite interesting for a party that has a long history of rigging polls. During the first ‘elections’ held in 1951 under the NC tutelage, most of the candidates for the constituent assembly were elected unopposed. This was repeated in 1951, with more than 50 percent of candidates winning unopposed as the NC threatened its rivals or got their nomination papers rejected to clear the ground.

It continued with its strong-arm tactics in the 1987 elections that ultimately led to the pro-freedom armed insurgency. After several years of bloodshed and president’s rule, nothing changed in the 1996 elections when a civilian government under Farooq Abdullah was installed following heavy engineering and outright fraud – a trend that continues to this day.

Confused commitment: Sumbal area of the Bandipora district witnessed the highest voter turnout in Kashmir, over 35 percent as compared with one to three percent in the rest of the valley, baffling some local observers. What was perhaps even more surprising was Ghulam Hassan Mir’s very strong yet confused commitment to the process of democracy. Mir, who claims to be “over 130 years old”, was flanked by his two relatives who led him to the polling booth at Government Degree College Sumbal. When the reporters asked about his motivation, he was disarmingly indifferent: “I don’t know why I cast my vote”. Mir claimed that he had voted several times in the past despite entertaining serious misgivings about politics, which he claimed was “perishing”. On an optimistic note, he believed that “God will solve all problems”.

God’s former sword: Contesting from Tankipora in old Srinagar city, a former pro-freedom militant-turned-BJP activist, Mohammad Farooq Khan, who in his previous avatar was known by his nom de guerre Saifullah, turned his voting into a public ritual. While displaying the ink-marked right index finger that confirmed he had voted, he paid rich tribute to his friends from the past “who are sleeping in their graves”.

Earlier, during his campaigning, the former militant claimed he was contesting “to heal the wounds of the people who are suffering for the lastthirty years”.

Last time, it was the former chief minister, Mehbooba Mufti, who profusely used the totem ‘healing touch’ to win public confidence. Once she was in power, a wave of unprecedented terror was unleashed in the region, with hundreds of peaceful protesters being murdered and wounded. Later, she justified her actions while taunting and blaming the victims for their own deaths.

Duty before death: Azad Singh alias Raju’s democratic credentials should certainly win him some otherworldly admiration. A BJP candidate in Ramban district, he died soon after casting his vote. According to a report in Kashmir Reader, Raju died of a heart attack “after he came out of the polling booth after casting his vote at ward two of Ramban municipality”.

Postscript: In other poll-related news, a voter was beaten up by angry youth in Khanabal, South Kashmir. According to news reports, the unnamed voter was intercepted by a group of youth as soon as he came out of the polling booth set up inside Khanabal High School. In some areas in North Kashmir, posters purportedly belonging to the Hizbul Mujahideen threatened people against voting.

In Sopore Town, poster bills, handwritten in Urdu, also contained warnings for the would-be poll participants. Some doubts were raised about the authenticity of these notices because they were attributed to the Tehreekul Mujahideen, a militant group that has ceased to exist for more than a decade now.

Twitter: @murtaza_shibli