Sanjeev Pargal
JAMMU, May 17: With three members of the Legislative Assembly getting elected to Lok Sabha in the Parliamentary elections yesterday, the strength of the Lower House would be reduced to 86 but the Election Department was unlikely to opt for by-election to these segments as Assembly elections in the State were due in less than six months.
Three MLAs, who were elected to Lok Sabha yesterday, included two from PDP and one from BJP.
PDP MLA from Wachi and Leader of Opposition in the Assembly Mehbooba Mufti was elected to Lok Sabha from Anantnag seat while his party colleague and former Deputy Chief Minister Muzaffar Hussain Baig, MLA from Baramulla Main, was elected from Baramulla Parliamentary seat. BJP state president Jugal Kishore Sharma, sitting MLA from Nagrota, was elected to Lok Sabha from Jammu-Poonch seat.
Significantly, only three sitting MLAs were in the fray for Lok Sabha elections and all of them won. Contrary to this, four sitting MPs were also contesting Lok Sabha elections (three from NC and one from Congress) and all of them lost. They were Dr Farooq Abdullah (Srinagar), Sharief-ud-Din Shariq (Baramulla), Dr Mehboob Beg (Anantnag) and Madan Lal Sharma (Congress).
Official sources told the Excelsior that all three MLAs would have to quit the membership of the Assembly before taking oath as Lok Sabha members. They were likely to submit their resignations as MLAs to Legislative Assembly Speaker Mubarak Gul shortly.
With this, strength of the Assembly would come down to 86. Presently, Assembly has 89 MLAs (87 elected and two Nominated women). The elections would reduce strength of the PDP from 21 to 19 and BJP from 10 to 9 in the Lower House.
The BJP has 11 MLAs but it hadn’t taken back former Union Minister and MLA Jammu West Prof Chaman Lal Gupta in the party fold.
The PDP would have to name another party leader as its Legislature Party leader in the Assembly. Sources said former Minister and three times MLA Abdul Rehman Veeri could be a strong contender for the post though the party was yet to take any decision.
Sources said the Election Department was unlikely to hold by-election to three Assembly seats of Nagrota, Wachi and Baramulla as Assembly elections in the State were due in next six months i.e. October-November as six years term of Jammu and Kashmir Assembly expired in the end of December.
As per the rules, the by-election on vacant Assembly seats had to be held within six months of the seat falling vacant. However, since Assembly elections were due in October-November, these three seats would remain vacant till the next elections, sources said.
Meanwhile, just concluded Lok Sabha elections on three seats of Jammu and Ladakh regions have thrown up various interesting trends including almost complete polarization among the voters in most of the districts with people in at least five districts including Jammu, Samba, Kathua, Udhampur and Leh voting en masse for BJP Prime Ministerial candidate Narendra Modi’s representatives.
Contrary to this, majority of electorates in the erstwhile Doda district, half of Reasi district, twin border districts of Rajouri and Poonch (barring two Assembly segments) and Kargil district voted against the BJP.
Official data revealed that six Assembly segments of erstwhile Doda district and two constituencies of Reasi district, all of which were dominated by the majority community, gave Union Minister for Health and Family Welfare Ghulam Nabi Azad massive lead over his BJP rival Dr Jitendera Singh but it was not enough as eight segments of Udhampur and Kathua districts and Reasi Main overshadowed the Congress lead.
In six segments of Doda, Ramban and Kishtwar districts (five of which are represented by Congress and one by NC in the Assembly), Azad polled 2.01 lakh votes while BJP mustered only 98,373 giving Congress a whopping lead of 1.03 lakh.
Similarly, Azad got 66,348 votes in Gool-Arnas and Gulabgarh segments in Reasi districts, both of which are represented by the NC-Congress Alliance MLAs, while BJP could get only 16496 votes and trailed by about 50,000 votes. Azad’s lead in just eight segments of erstwhile Doda district and two constituencies of Reasi was over 1.5 lakh over the BJP.
However, the BJP’s lead of 1.39 lakh in Kathua district and 75,000 in three segments of Udhampur and Reasi Main (totaling over 2.14 lakh) led to defeat of Azad by over 60,000 votes.
The BJP polled about 2.11 lakh votes in five segments of Kathua district as against just 71502 of Congress while in Udhampur district and Reasi Main, Jitendera Singh secured 1.62 lakh votes while Azad could muster only 87010.
Meanwhile, BJP candidate Jugal Kishore Sharma, who yesterday won Jammu-Poonch Lok Sabha seat by over 2.57 lakh votes defeating his nearest Congress rival and two times MP Madan Lal Sharma, got majority of his about 6.2 lakh votes from 13 Assembly segments of Jammu and Samba districts and two Assembly constituencies of Rajouri district, which were dominated by a particular community.
Fifteen Assembly segments of Jammu Parliamentary seat (11 of Jammu district, two of Samba and two from Rajouri) alone gave the BJP about 5.92 lakh votes while he got just 28,545 votes from remaining five majority community dominated segments of Poonch and Rajouri districts including Darhal, Rajouri, Poonch-Haveli, Surankote and Mendhar.
While the BJP candidate polled 5.3 lakh votes in 13 Assembly segments of Jammu and Samba district, he got 62,934 votes from Kalakote and Nowshera constituencies of Rajouri districts. It were these 15 Assembly segments, which decimated the Congress, which polls just 2.25 lakh votes in Jammu and Samba (even less than half of the BJP votes) while in Kalakote and Nowshera, he got just 25,932 votes, again less than half of the votes taken by the BJP.
However, three Assembly segments of Poonch and two of Rajouri districts have Congress and PDP the bulk of their votes.
PDP candidates Yashpal Sharma secured 80751 votes in three segments of Poonch while Congress secured 60344 as against just 10447 by the BJP.
The combined vote of BJP in three segments of Poonch and two of Rajouri (Rajouri Main and Darhal) was just 28,545 as against 1.14 lakh of Congress and 1.22 lakh of PDP.
Almost similar was the polarization in Ladakh seat. While Buddhist dominated Leh district split between BJP and Congress, which had fielded Buddhist candidates, Shia Muslims dominated Kargil district was divided between two Shia candidates-Ghulam Raza and Syed Mohammad Kazim Sabri.
BJP candidate Thupstan Chhewang, who won Ladakh seat with just 36 votes, polled 27,429 votes in Leh while his Congress rival Tsering Samphel polled 23,823 votes as against just 1592 votes of Raza and 2000 of Sabri.
In Kargil, Raza got 29,457 votes and Sabri 26,197 while Chhewang got only 3302 and Samphel 2162 votes.
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