J&K and Haryana Elections 2024: The two Contrasting Results

 

J&K and Haryana Elections 2024: The two Contrasting Results

The elections to the Assembly of the Union Territory of Jammu & Kashmir(J&K), held in three phases between 18^th September and 1 October 2024, and to the State Assembly of Haryana, held in a single phase, on 5 October, have thrown up contrasting results, proving the exit polls wrong. The exit polls predicted that in J&K there would be hung verdict, while the Congress would sweep Haryana.  The National Conference and Congress alliance has won a clear majority in J&K, while the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has retained Haryana for the third consecutive term.  Though the result in J&K was somewhat on expected lines, the result in Hayana was shocking. No one expected the BJP to win in Haryana, and the Congress to lose. What explains these contrasting results?

 

The Result in J&K

 

There has been no election in J&K since 2014. The elections in J&K were held after a gap of ten years. During these years, the State has suffered immensely, even facing existential crisis. No state of the Union of India had suffered so much as this predominately Muslim majority border state. By keeping the Assembly in suspended animation, the state was brought under the Governor’s rule in June 2018 and subsequently under the President’s rule, after dissolving the assembly, from December 2018.  On August 5, 2019, the Government of India had stripped the State of its autonomy and statehood, by abrogating the Article 370 of the Constitution  that conferred special status on the state, and downgraded the state by bifurcating it into two Union Territories – J&K with an elected assembly, and Ladakh without - the state turning into a police state with unprecedented clamp down on political leaders and dissenters, commutations and internet connections snapped and the army deployed everywhere. The state had the ignominy of losing its historical and religious-cultural identity.

 

The Centre undertook the contentious delimitation process in J&K, in 2022, while the nation-wide delimitation is due in 2026.  The delimitation has resulted in increasing the J&K Assembly seats from 83 (excluding 4 of Ladakh) to 90 – raising the number of seats in Jammu from 37 to 43 and from 46 to 47 in Kashmir. This gerrymandering was undertaken to favour the Hindu majority Jammu region, so the ruling BJP could derive electoral dividends. This has not gone well in the Valley.

 

It was the Supreme Court order last year that the Election in J&K should be held by 30^th September 2024 that forced the Election Commission of India to hold the elections. Otherwise, the Centre would not have held the election. And with the Election Commission unwilling to exercise its constitutional mandate to conduct free and fair election, without a signal form the Centre, the latter could have preferred to postpone the election till such time the situation favoured the ruling dispensation.

 

The people of Kashmir were angry for depriving them of their statehood and the outsiders coming to state to do their business, encroaching on their lands and setting up their own business and then employing the people from outside the state, with unemployment reaching all-time high. It was under this background the elections in J&K were held. The elections elicited an overwhelming response, not just from ordinary people, but also from the separatists, who hitherto boycotted the polling, and who showed up in droves to exercise their vote. They saw the elections as the last opportunity to restore their identity and honour and to end the draconian rule by Lt. Governor. The LG’s power is enhanced recently vis-a-vis elected government, making him all powerful agent of the Centre, elected government becoming a lame-duck government, something similar to that of the Delhi administration.

 

The election result in J&K is a rejection of the Centre’s Kashmir policy and all its actions, following the J&K State Reorganization Act 2019 and the dilution of Article 35A that preserved the unique identity of the state. The victory of the National Conference and the Congress alliance brought the two parties- the oldest mainstream party in J& K and the grand old party of India - together to heal the wound and restore the statehood. The people have reposed faith in them, being the parties with whom their destiny is intertwined. Recently, Farooq Abdulla said that it was due to the National Conference that J&K became a part of India in 1947 or else it would have lost to Pakistan.

 

The victory of the National Conference and Congress alliance reveals that the polarization in J&K - Muslims vs Hindus. The BJP remains essentially a party of Hindus in Jammu region. It polled just around 2% votes in Kashmir, secured zero seats out of 47, in spite of contesting 16 seats. The BJP propped up a large number of independent candidates, as its proxies. They have lost their relevance. The Jammu and Kashmir regions are two different entities, each distrusting the other.  The Modi government failed to resolve this. In terms of the larger polarization, Jammu voting for the BJP and the Kashmir voting for the non-BJP parties, nothing has changed compared to the 2014 contest. Both the BJP and NC have put up their best performance ever and emerged the largest parties in Jammu region and Kashmir region respectively.

 

If the J&IK situation is back to square one today, who is responsible for all that the traumatic experience the people of the state had, and the insult and humiliation they suffered! In fact, J&K was more harmonious in 2014 than it is today. Should not the Moodi government be held accountable for pursuing the ill-conceived policies and actions in the state during the past ten years, particularly the downgrading of the state, for political expediency to gain electorally? The terrorism has not come down. The security personnel and the civilians continued to be targeted and killed by the terrorists, whose base is now shifted to Jammu region, not confined to the Valley.

 

The result in Haryana

 

The result in Haryana was shocking. No one expected the Congress to lose and the BJP to return to power, considering the factors such as the anti-incumbency; the ill-treatment and humiliation of farmers and women wrestlers; unprecedented unemployment among the youth who take to the ‘dunki' route to smuggle into America in search of some means of livelihood; massive drug problem and misgovernance of last 10 years. Farmers issues, wrestlers' protests, and Agnipath didn't matter to the voters, and it looked like the people voted against their own interests. The Congress had created a fantastic manifesto that sought to address Haryana's problems. Its Kisan-Jawan-Pehelwan poll pitch also didn’t resonate on the ground. 

 

At a Press Conference held, while the counting of votes was in progress, on 8 October, the Congress General Secretary Jairam Ramesh complained: “the results in Haryana are unexpected, surprising and that we don’t accept them because this is a defeat of democracy… very serious complaints on the process of counting, the functioning of EVMs in at least three districts. There are more that are coming in… If the verdict goes against the ground reality, it goes against what people in Haryana had made up their mind for…Under these circumstances, it is not possible for us to accept the results that have been announced. Serious questions have been raised by our candidates…We will bring them to the notice of the EC. What we have seen today in Haryana is a victory for manipulation, a victory for subverting the will of the people… The chapter on Haryana is not complete." He said at least 12 seats have been affected by EVMs malfunctioning. It could be more than:   ECI is our first stop. We will seek time from them. Then, afterwards, whatever has to be done will be done.” The Congress lost the election despite increasing its vote share by nearly 12% compared to 2019.

 

On 9 August, a delegation of top leaders of the Congress met the Election Commission and submitted a memorandum stating that they received complaints from many Assembly segments about malfunctioning of the EVMs and demanded a probe and sealing and securing of the machines till the investigation is completed. And speaking to the reporters after the meeting, Pawan Khera, the Party's Media and Publicity Department Head, said: "The returning officers did not match VVPAT slips in several constituencies. This is a big reason.  We have asked that the VVPAT slips be matched so that the truth comes out." Since it is a question of the people's mandate, the Election Commission should investigate impartially the complaint made by the principal national opposition party.

 

The Association for Democratic Reforms and a Civil Society group - Vote for Democracy- had investigated the malpractices during the Lok Sabha polls and released a report. According to the report, there were huge discrepancies between the votes cast and the votes counted, showing an increase of around 4.7 crore votes cast affecting the results of 79 seats in 15 states. The Election Commission did not come out with any explanation on this. All this raises question about the integrity of the election.   

 

One factor that seems to have contributed to the victory of BJP the BJP in Haryana is: Jat vs. non-Jat. The result shows that 48% of Jats and 38% non-Jats voted for the Congress, while 37.5 % Jats and 59% non-Jats voted for the BJP. The BJP succeeded in pitting the non-Jats against the Jats. 

 

The Hindutva is still a constituency for the BJP. The Hindutva played a part in the BJP’s victory in Haryana, and Jammu's Hindu vote went big for the BJP. In the post Lok Sabha election, the notion that the Hindu vote, crafted in 2014 and 20-19, was fracturing had gained currency. These results show the jury is still out.

 

If J&K voted against the BJP, because of its divisive and communal agenda and insensitivity to the people's plight, Haryana voted back the BJP to power, because of the consolidation of non-Jats, fearing the latter's domination. Thus, these two state elections reveal that religion and caste are still the dominant factors, determining the electoral fortunes, even pushing the real issues to the back burner.