E-Paper
Counting date changed for poll-bound J&K, Mehbooba Mufti says Election Commission ‘does what suits BJP’
The ECI postponed voting in Haryana to October 5 from October 1. As a result, the counting for both Haryana and J&K, will be on October 8, instead of October 4.
A day after the Election Commission announced a new date for the counting of votes in poll-bound Haryana and Jammu & Kashmir, Mehbooba Mufti, former chief minister of Jammu & Kashmir, on Sunday accused the poll panel of doing ‘what suits the BJP,’ the ruling party at the Centre.
The change in dates will lead to a seven-day gap between the final leg of polling in J&K and the counting day.
“They (ECI) do what suits the BJP. When I contested the (Lok Sabha) elections, they unnecessarily changed the date (of polling). Everything is done as per the wishes of the BJP and its proxy parties,” she charged, according to PTI.
Mufti, who leads the PDP, was addressing reporters at the party headquarters in Srinagar. She was the last chief minister of J&K before the BJP government at the Centre, led by prime minister Narendra Modi, withdrew the region's special status in August 2019.
The same year, it was bifurcated and converted from a state to a Union territory, which meant that instead of an elected chief minister, it would be helmed by a Centre-appointed lieutenant governor.
Politicians in the Valley have been bitterly opposed to these moves of the Modi government.
Meanwhile, the upcoming assembly elections will be also the first assembly polls here since December 2014. Then, the PDP and BJP, the largest and second-largest parties, respectively, formed a coalition government. Their uneasy alliance, however, ended in June 2018.
Meanwhile, polling for the 2024 Jammu & Kashmir assembly elections, will be done as per the original schedule: September 18, 25, and October 1. Haryana too was to vote on October 1, in a single phase.
Now, Haryana will poll on October 5 and the results for both places will be declared on October 8, instead of October 4.
