Kashmir’s split verdict: Democracy or division?

Valley backs NC alliance, Jammu stands with BJP as the region’s first Assembly election in a decade highlights distinct regional choices.

National Conference (NC) vice president Omar Abdullah addresses an election campaign for the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly Election, in Kupwara on September 29. | Photo Credit: Mohammad Amin War/ANI

After a decade, Jammu and Kashmir has elected its representatives for the legislative Assembly. The Union Territory’s people have given a historic mandate to the National Conference (NC)-Congress-CPI(M) alliance, with 49 of the 90 Assembly seats. The last time any party or pre-election bloc crossed the majority mark was in the 1996 Assembly election.

In 1996, the NC bagged 54 (if we exclude Leh-Ladakh and Kargil region) of 83 Assembly seats. Since then, the highest number of seats won by any party has been 28.

This time, the NC alone won 42 seats. The BJP with 29 seats occupies the position of the main opposition party in the House. In a remarkable feat, the BJP bagged the second-highest number of seats for the second time, the first being in 2014. In 2014, the BJP won 30 seats (after accounting for the conversion of seats based on the delimitation in 2022). The biggest loser in this election is Mehbooba Mufti’s Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). It won 29 seats in 2014 but was reduced to just 3 seats this time. The PDP lost 14 per cent of the votes (see Table 2) as well, compared with the previous Assembly election.

The mandate looks like a huge, consolidated victory in terms of seats won by the parties and alliances, but a deep dive into the data reveals many variations. At the aggregate level, the result suggests that the NC alliance received overwhelming support from the people and won the majority, but at the vote-share level, the alliance received 36 per cent or a little over one-third of the total votes only, which is 3 per cent less than the parties’ combined vote share in 2014. However, it is the Congress’ loss of votes that has led to the drop in the alliance’s vote share. The Congress contested the 2014 election without tying up with the NC and received 17 per cent of the votes, but this time the party received just 12 per cent. The NC gained a 2 per cent vote share.

PDP president Mehbooba Mufti. | Photo Credit: PTI

Apart from the major parties, Independents (including the Jamaat-e-Islami and Engineer Rashid’s Awami Ittehad Party [AIP]) received 17 per cent of the votes, 10 per cent more than in 2014. The other small parties, including the Peoples Conference (PC) and the Bahujan Samaj Party, received 13 per cent of the votes, 5 per cent more than in the previous election (see Table 2).

The region-wise results make it clear that Jammu and the Valley stand for two very distinct support bases. The BJP won all its seats in the Jammu region (29 of 43) with a 45 per cent vote share. In the Valley, it drew a blank. The NC-led alliance won 41 of the 47 seats in the Valley with a 42 per cent vote share. The NC alone won 35 seats, 24 more than in the previous election. These two numbers clearly show that the Jammu and Kashmir regions have given a split verdict to the two main parties/alliances.

The two regions of Jammu and the Kashmir Valley have three subregions each; the Valley being divided into Central, North, and South, and Jammu into the Chenab Valley, Jammu, and Pir Panjal subregions. The deeper we analyse the data along these lines, the more we notice significant variations in the outcomes at the subregional level.

Peoples Conference (PC) chief Sajad Lone. | Photo Credit: PTI

In the Valley, the NC and the PDP used to be the main contenders. However, for the past few years, the PDP has been a declining force here. The party that bagged 26 of the 47 seats in the Valley in 2014 could manage to win only 3 this time. Its decline was visible even in the Lok Sabha election earlier this year. The PDP was once not just an electoral opponent of the NC in the Valley region, it was also an ideological challenger. However, the party’s support base dwindled after it allied with the BJP in 2015.

In the Lok Sabha election this year, a new political force emerged. Engineer Rashid won the Baramulla seat, defeating two stalwarts: Omar Abdullah and Sajad Lone (PC). Rashid’s victory created a buzz because he won from jail, with his son campaigning for him. It seemed to indicate that the people of the Valley were not happy with the two established parties and thought Rashid would better represent their voice. However, the Assembly election did not reflect this trend. While Rashid had leads in 14 of the 18 Assembly segments in the Lok Sabha election, his AIP could not even open its account in the Assembly election. The AIP and its alliance partner, the Jamaat-e-Islami, received just about 2 per cent of the votes. The Jamaat, contesting an election after 35 years, had hoped to benefit from the influence it had in South Kashmir, but all it could manage was a little over 5 per cent of the total vote share of South Kashmir.

Similarly, the AIP, which was expected to do well in the Kashmir region, performed poorly. It received just 3 per cent of the votes in Central and South Kashmir.

Member of Parliament and Awami Ittehad Party (AIP) chief Sheikh Abdul Rashid, popularly known as Engineer Rashid, addresses a press conference ahead of the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly election, in Srinagar, on September 12, 2024. | Photo Credit: PTI

The overall outcome suggests that the NC has regained its pre-eminent position after a long time. While the PDP was decimated and the AIP failed to win voters over, the NC succeeded in convincing the Valley’s electorate that it was the only party that could form a stable and strong government and bargain with the Central government for statehood and the other privileges lost in August 2019. Whether the NC alliance will succeed or not, only time will tell.

Highlights

• The National Conference (NC)-Congress-CPI(M) alliance won 49 out of 90 Assembly seats, marking the first time since 1996 that any party or pre-election bloc has crossed the majority mark.
• There’s a clear split between the Kashmir Valley and the Jammu region. The NC-led alliance dominated in the Valley, winning 41 of 47 seats with a 42 per cent vote share. In contrast, the BJP won all its 29 seats in the Jammu region with a 45 per cent vote share, but drew a blank in the Valley.
• The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) faced a significant setback, dropping from 29 seats in 2014 to just 3 seats this time. New political forces like the Awami Ittehad Party failed to make a significant impact despite earlier promise.

In Jammu’s three subregions, which are based on geographical variation—Jammu in the plains, and Chenab and Pir Panjal in the mountains—the Congress used to have a lot of influence. However, the BJP broke this trend in 2014 with the Congress’ huge electoral base shifting loyalties. In the 2014 Assembly election, the BJP won 25 of the 37 seats (before the 2022 delimitation of the State) in this region. After the delimitation exercise, the total number of seats in the Jammu region went up to 43, and of these the BJP was in the lead in 30 (the seat conversion exercise was carried out by the Data Action Lab for Emerging Societies [DALES] team after identifying and matching polling booth data).

In this election, the BJP won 29 Assembly seats: 22 in Jammu, 6 in Chenab, and 1 in Pir Panjal. In terms of vote share, both in Chenab and Pir Panjal, the BJP received around one-third of the total vote share (see Table 4). However, in the Jammu subregion, which has the highest number of Assembly seats (24), the BJP received the lion’s share (54 per cent).

The NC alliance managed to receive just one-fourth of the total votes in the Jammu subregion. The PDP received 0.38 per cent votes—the party had 5 per cent in the Jammu subregion in the 2014 Assembly election. In Chenab and Pir Panjal, the NC alliance had an edge over the BJP.

The regional-level analysis clearly suggests that the Union Territory’s two different regions have also expressed two distinct electoral choices. The NC has emerged strong in the Valley, whereas Jammu, where the BJP has been growing continuously, clearly favours the national party. How this will impact administrative decisions in the days to come is the critical question now. 

Ashish Ranjan is an election researcher and co-founder of Data Action Lab for Emerging Societies.