- Over a million were able to vote in local polls for the first time
- BJP aims to seize control of assemblies from Muslim parties
- Pakistan accuses India of marginalizing Kashmiri Muslims
JAMMU/SRINAGAR, India, Jan 12 (Portal) – For the first time in her life, Asha, a street cleaner in the Indian city of Jammu, will be allowed to vote in the upcoming local elections. And she’s sure who’s going to get her ballot.
Asha plans to reward Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for abandoning decades-old policies that deny her and a million other people in the Jammu and Kashmir region many of the same rights as other Indians.
“We faced the humiliation in silence, but Modi-ji changed our lives forever,” she said, leaning on her broom. “Not just me and my children, future generations from our community in Jammu and Kashmir will vote for the BJP.”
The Hindu nationalist party is counting on Asha’s voice as it pushes to take control of India’s part of the Himalayas, hotly contested by neighboring Pakistan and ruled almost exclusively by Muslim prime ministers.
The BJP hopes adding up to a million mostly Hindu voters to the electoral roll, new voting limits, seven more seats in the regional assembly and reserving nine for groups likely to support the BJP will give it a chance to win become largest party in the legislature with 90 seats.
Portal has interviewed three dozen federal and state officials, six groups representing disenfranchised residents and analyzed the latest data to reveal for the first time the scale of the BJP’s push into Kashmir – and why it may succeed.
A BJP majority would be a seismic shift, and even talk of a strong performance underscores how Modi has trampled on old taboos to advance his agenda in every corner of the country of 1.4 billion.
The 72-year-old, who is set to run for a third term in 2024, has combined promises of prosperity and social mobility with a robust Hindu-first agenda to dominate Indian politics.
A BJP victory in the disputed region could cement India’s claim to the territory on a global scale.
“We are committed to crossing more than 50 seats to form the next government with an overwhelming majority,” BJP President for Jammu and Kashmir Ravinder Raina told Portal. “The next prime minister will be from our party.”
For many Muslims in Jammu and Kashmir, the BJP’s policies, which are upending decades of autonomy and privilege, represent a dangerous new phase in what they see as a nationwide push to defend the rights of the Hindu majority against minority groups.
Bharatiya Janata Party is located in Jammu and Kashmir
‘ILLEGAL APPEAL’
Pakistan has claimed Kashmir since the partition of India in 1947, and the countries have fought two wars over the region, which is also partly claimed by China. Pakistan accuses India of attempting to use its policies there to marginalize Muslims.
“India is pursuing a strategy to perpetuate its illegal occupation through disenfranchisement of Kashmiris by changing the demographic structure of illegally occupied Indian Jammu and Kashmir from a Muslim-majority to a Hindu-dominated area,” the government of Pakistan said in a statement Portal.
Jammu and Kashmir is divided into two. According to a 2011 census, Jammu has a population of about 5.3 million, of which 62% are Hindus, while the Kashmir valley has a population of 6.7 million, of which 97% are Muslim. According to estimates by surveyors and high-level bureaucrats, the population in 2021 was 15.5 million.
From 1954, the Indian region enjoyed a special status in the Indian Constitution.
The shift in the political landscape came in 2019 when the BJP-led parliament in New Delhi revoked that status, which had denied rights to many Hindu communities not considered to be in the region.
Since 2020, the BJP has required everyone in Jammu and Kashmir to apply for residency certificates that allow them to vote in local elections, buy agricultural land and permanent homes, and apply for government universities and jobs.
According to the regional government and associations representing six previously disenfranchised groups, just over a million people have the right to vote in local elections for the first time – and 96% come from castes within the Hindu hierarchy.
Of those individuals, 698,800 had received residence certificates as of December, official records from Portal show. Government data showed that another 7,346 retired bureaucrats and army officers had signed up.
Portal spoke to 36 people who now enjoy full citizenship. All said they would vote for the BJP in the general election.
Asha, a Hindu who has gone by a single name since her divorce, said the changes have brought nothing but good.
Her family, at the bottom of the Hindu caste system, had been stuck in menial labor since they were invited from Punjab in 1957 to fill in for striking sanitation workers. Now her two children are studying to become teachers.
“No one will ever understand what it feels like when an educated kid is told to sweep the streets,” she said.
SPECIAL STATUS
Until the region’s special status was lifted, secular left-wing parties with Muslim leaders had controlled the local assembly, and those who ruled India from New Delhi tended not to attempt political autonomy in the region.
The assembly that controls the state budget, spending, employment, education and economic activity has been dissolved and a lieutenant governor appointed to run the region until local elections can be held – which could be as early as this spring.
In anticipation of protests following the move, authorities imposed a curfew, shut down the internet, tightened security and placed hundreds of Muslims and other opposition leaders under house arrest for months. They have since been released.
An Islamist militant insurgency and public protests against Indian rule have killed thousands, mostly in the 1990s when violence was at its peak.
Scores more civilians, security forces and militants have been killed since the special status was lifted.
Many Muslims have yet To for certificates of residence, mistrusting the BJP’s ultimate goals, although some say they may have to do so if their refusal causes problems.
Previously unreported official records show that just over 5.3 million certificates had been issued through September.
The government has not said what will happen to those who don’t join the scheme, although they can still vote in local elections with permanent residence cards.
“All these laws like domicile and demarcation (boundary changes) have served only one purpose: to change the predominantly Muslim character of the state,” said Mehbooba Mufti, a former prime minister of Jammu and Kashmir who was once allied with the BJP. She was arrested without charge in 2019 and released the following year.
View of the Bharatiya Janata Party in Jammu and Kashmir Allocation of constituencies of the Legislative Assembly
REASONABLE CAMPAIGN
Raina of the BJP said Modi’s policies have ended the injustice suffered by tens of thousands who have lived in the region for decades and, in the case of some families, centuries.
The 46-year-old Jammu native said the process aims to level the playing field rather than secure votes, although that could be a by-product.
“The BJP is not working to dilute the power of the Muslim-majority Kashmir Valley, but it is our duty to empower every citizen of India. In the case of Jammu and Kashmir, they happen to be Hindus.”
The BJP has been trying to take their advantage home.
Nine of the 90 seats – six in Kashmir and three in Jammu – are now reserved for marginalized communities for the first time, and they are likely to support the BJP.
The party also launched a door-to-door campaign in 2020, involving hundreds of officials, to identify those who would benefit from certificates of residence – and potentially vote for the BJP.
Mohammed Iqbal was one of the officials. The ‘tehsildar’ or executive magistrate and tax collector for the Pulwama region near Srinagar held educational gatherings in the hilly terrain and organized visits to ensure people enrolled.
Even during the COVID-19 pandemic, work did not stand still. Isolation tents were set up to allow people to apply for certificates while lockdown restrictions and social distancing rules were in place. Now the process has largely moved online.
“We are under direct orders from the government to quickly complete the issuance of certificates of residence,” Iqbal said.
By early December, about 70% of the 600,000 people in the Iqbal region had received certificates, although only a minority will receive new rights, he said.
The BJP has also strengthened its position, thanks to a government panel redefining its boundaries and a new method of allocating assembly seats.
Under the new structure, Hindu-dominated Jammu will gain six more seats, bringing its representation to 43, while Muslim-dominated Kashmir would increase by one to 47 seats.
Marginalized groups such as the Asha Sweepers and the Hindu group of West Pakistani refugees who settled in post-partition Jammu and Kashmir are among those who will gain full citizenship for the first time.
The refugee community alone numbers more than 650,000.
“We are now entitled to cast our votes and finally enjoy all fundamental rights. We thank the Modi government for making this a reality,” said Labharam Gandhi, president of the association representing refugees from West Pakistan.
View of the Bharatiya Janata Party in Jammu and Kashmir Party voting share
Reporting by Rupam Jain in Jammu and Srinagar, Kanupriya Kapoor in Singapore; Additional reporting by Fayaz Bukhari in Srinagar and Gibran Naiyyar Peshimam in Islamabad; Edited by Mike Collett-White and David Clarke
Our standards: The Thomson Portal Trust Principles.