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Final nail in democracy’s coffin, Mufti slams BJP over ‘back-door’ voters in J&K
Chief Electoral Officer Hirdesh Kumar Singh on Wednesday said anyone residing and not necessarily a permanent resident can become a voter in Jammu & Kashmir and around 2.5 million new voters are expected to be enrolled
Former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti on Thursday accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of “bringing voters from back-door to install a fascist” a day the region’s top electoral official said anyone residing and not necessarily a permanent resident can become a voter in Jammu & Kashmir. She alleged there was an attempt to change Jammu & Kashmir’s demography and called it the final nail in the coffin of electoral democracy.
Chief Electoral Officer Hirdesh Kumar Singh on Wednesday said around 2.5 million new voters are expected to be enrolled following a special revision of the electoral roll following the revocation of J&K’s semi-autonomous status, which prevented non-residents from buying property and getting government jobs until 2019. He said ordinarily residing persons in the region can vote and include migrant workers, businesspersons, students, and armed forces personnel.
Mufti requested National Conference president Farooq Abdullah to call an all-party meeting to decide the next course of action and invite even those who they have differences of opinion with. She alleged half of the rigging and gerrymandering was done through a delimitation process of redrawing constituencies ahead of the assembly polls.
Mufti added the BJP now wants to reduce the voting power of the people of J&K. “ ...they want to disenfranchise people...2.5 million voters of BJP will come from outside...” She said the BJP has only one motive of forming governments everywhere.
“In Jammu & Kashmir, they want to install a fascist local, using fraudulent elections. Three years have passed since they have directly ruled here and still they could not break the resolve of the people. Now they are using a back-door and bringing 2.5 million voters of BJP to bring demographic changes. These changes are not against Muslims only but also against Jammu’s Dogras and Pandits,” she said.
Mufti said the BJP “subverted” Jammu & Kashmir’s Constitution and flag with the revocation of the region’s semi-autonomous status in 2019 unconstitutionally. “After 2024 [national] elections, they are going to finish the Constitution of this country and change its flag to the bhagwa [saffron]. They want to turn this country into a BJP nation and not a Hindu nation.”
She requested all parties to come and fight together. “It has never happened in any other state that 2.5 million voters would be brought from outside,” she said. “...it is a matter of survival for the people of J&K. We will discuss our future course of action to stop this.”
The assembly elections in Jammu & Kashmir are likely to be delayed and could happen only in 2023 with a delay in the publication of the final electoral roll by a month.
The Election Commission of India initially directed that the rolls be published by October 25 as part of the mandatory process before the election dates could be announced. The final roll will now be published on November 25. A draft roll was to be prepared by August 31 before its finalisation. In May, a Delimitation Commission submitted its final report, paving the way for assembly polls.
Jammu & Kashmir has been without an elected government since the BJP withdrew its support to Mufti’s People’s Democratic Party-led ruling coalition in June 2018.
