Events & Issues
New Delhi, 14 May
2022
J&K
Delimitation
CHANGING
POLITICAL EQUATION?
By
Sagarneel Sinha
The final draft of
the Jammu and Kashmir Delimitation Commission is out, and it has, as expected resulted
in a political controversy with the Opposition parties, particularly from the
Kashmir valley, criticising the recommendations.
The Commission has
proposed to increase seven new seats, i.e. six for Jammu and one for Kashmir
for the legislative Assembly of Jammu and Kashmir, presently a Union Territory.
As a result, the new assembly will have 90 seats -- 47 from Kashmir and 43 from
Jammu. The two dominant Valley-based parties, the National Conference of the Abdullahs
and the People’s Democratic Party of Muftis, aren’t happy with these proposals.
They see the current developments as “unholy designs of the Narendra Modi-led
BJP government to reduce the majority Muslims of Jammu and Kashmir into a
minority”.
It isn’t the first
time that such allegations are heard from the dominant Valley-based parties,
who have been quite vocal since the abrogation of Article 370 in August 2019 by
the Modi government. The majority of Muslims constitute 69% of the population
of the UT, while Hindus, the largest religious minority, account for 29%. In
the Kashmir division, the Hindus constitute a meagre 2% while Muslims
constitute 30% in the Jammu division.
Therefore, it can be
seen that the Muslims constitute a substantial minority even in the Jammu
division, which has seen an increase of 6 seats — one each from Kathua, Samba,
Reasi, Kishtwar, Doda and Rajouri. Out of these districts, only in Kathua and
Samba are the Hindus in majority whereas in Kishtwar, Doda and Rajouri the Muslims
are a majority. In the Reasi district, Muslims and Hindus are almost equal with
the former accounting for 49.7% and the latter 48.9%.
The Commission also
recommends the reservation of nine seats, i.e. six in the Jammu division and three in the Kashmir
division -- for Scheduled Tribes (STs) in the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative
Assembly for the first time. Isn’t this a big development for the tribals like
Gujjars and Bakarwals of the Union Territory? Those who lament that the “soul
of Jammu and Kashmir was taken away on August 5, 2019” should ask themselves
why there was no ST reservation in the erstwhile State Assembly. Why does the
reservation of STs never matter? According to the 2011 Census, out of 14.9 lakh
STs of erstwhile Jammu and Kashmir (which included Ladakh), 13.2 lakh of them
are Muslims.
Another development
that is attracting criticism is the addition of the Poonch and Rajouri
districts to the Anantnag Lok Sabha constituency. These two districts fall
under the Jammu division. On the other hand, Pulwama, Tral and some areas of
Shopian were taken out of the Anantnag constituency and added to the Srinagar
Lok Sabha seat. The reconstruction of the Anantnag parliamentary seat,
represented twice by PDP supremo Mehbooba Mufti in the past, has also left the Valley-based
dominant parties unhappy. They see it as an attempt by the Centre to make way
for a saffron victory from the seat.
Importantly, both
Poonch and Rajouri are Muslim majority districts. In Poonch, Muslims account
for 90% with only 7% Hindus. Only in the Rajouri district, Hindus with 34%
constitute a substantial majority. The question is if minority Hindus get leverage
in the Anantnag Lok Sabha seat, should there be a problem?
The labelling of
allegations that the BJP government at the Centre is trying to “snatch away the
rights of Kashmiri Muslims” has become an essential part in the last three years
for the Abdullahs and Muftis of the Valley. For a long time, the erstwhile
Jammu and Kashmir State was dominated by one family, the Abdullah family, which
has always held complete authority on NC, the Valley’s oldest political party.
Later the State saw the emergence of another family, the Muftis, who also
enjoyed the fruits of power through their party, PDP.
But how many chief
ministers were from Jammu? Only one, Congress’ Ghulam Nabi Azad, who was in the
post only for three years. Significantly, the erstwhile State never had a chief
minister from the minority Hindus, despite the community accounting for around
29% of the population. From this, one can understand that a section of Valley-based
politicians and parties have always had the larger share of the cake. Even the
Muslim tribals weren’t given the ST status then. Not to mention the refugees of
West Pakistan (today’s Pakistan) who didn’t even have the right to vote in the
erstwhile State, despite staying in Jammu for decades. It was only after the abrogation
of Article 370, that these refugees, who are mostly Hindus with 80% of them
belonging to the Scheduled Castes, got the recognition they deserved.
One of the important
aspects of the Delimitation Commission is that it has recommended two nominated
seats for Kashmiri migrants — basically, the minority Hindu Kashmiri Pandits,
who had to forcefully leave the Valley as a result of Islamic terrorism. They
are given the rights at par with the nominated members of the Puducherry
Legislative Assembly, which means that the nominated Pandit members will have
the right to exercise their votes during the Budget and in a No-confidence
motion.
Apart from this, the
Commission has recommended to the Centre for giving representation to the
displaced persons of Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK). Although the Commission
didn’t specify the seats for this neglected community, it has preferred to
continue with the tradition of keeping 24 Assembly seats reserved for PoK
vacant. This has left the displaced persons of PoK staying in Jammu for decades
unhappy.
On May 8, thousands
of displaced persons rallied in Jammu to make the Centre agree to give
nominations for their community as recommended by the Commission in the Assembly
like the Kashmiri Pandits. Ramesh Sabbarwal, head of the Jammu Kashmir’s People
Forum, said, as reported by the Indian Express, that since one-third of people
had got displaced from areas of PoK in 1947, 8 of the 24 seats reserved for
them should be put into elections. This is a fair demand. Instead of keeping 24
seats vacant, it would be better for India to fill these seats through the
displaced persons of PoK.
The Delimitation
Commission may have some drawbacks but at least it has tried to give power to
the political aspirations of neglected sections — Scheduled Tribes (most of
whom are Muslims), minority Hindu Kashmiri Pandits and also the people of
Jammu, who often have complained about the dominance of the two Valley-based
dynastic parties, which also face criticisms for not focussing on real problems
of common people. Jammu and Kashmir shouldn’t be a hostage to any family — and
the Commission seems to have tried to address this.
The responsibility
lies on the Centre to ensure the political aspirations of all sections of
people, irrespective of their religion, caste or region. There has been no
functional Assembly for the last four years and as a result, currently, the Union
Territory doesn’t even have any representation in the Rajya Sabha. It will be
better if the Centre conducts the Assembly elections in the UT with no further
delay. Security challenges, however, remain for the Centre.---INFA
(Copyright, India
News & Feature Alliance)
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