*JKNPP, BSP, DPAP, ASP (KR), several other parties decimated
Bivek Mathur
JAMMU, Oct 8: Proving several pollsters right, Mehraj Din Malik from Doda defeated the Bharatiya Janata Party’s Gajay Singh Rana and several other political bigwigs, including a former Minister and a former MLA, in the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly election to open the Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP’s) account in Jammu and Kashmir.
On his stupendous performance, AAP Supremo and former Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal congratulated Mehraj on X and accepted the latter’s invitation through a video call to participate in a programme in Doda on October 10.
“Many congratulations on the grand victory of AAP candidate from Doda, Mehraj Malik, against the BJP. You fought the election very well. Congratulations to the entire party for having an MLA in the fifth State,” Kejriwal wrote on X in Hindi.
Meanwhile, several Jammu-based as well as National parties, including Jammu and Kashmir National Panthers Party (India), Jammu and Kashmir National Panthers Party (Bhim), Democratic Progressive Azad Party (DPAP), Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), Azad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram), Janta Dal (United), Shiv Sena (UBT), NDPI, Sainik Samaj Party, National Awami United Party, Haq Insaf Party, and Hindustan Shakti Sena, among other parties, failed to open their account in Jammu and Kashmir.
AAP’s Mehraj won with a margin of 4,538 votes as he polled a total of 23,228 votes against 18,690 votes polled in favour of Bharatiya Janata Party’s Gajay Singh Rana.
While former MLA and Jammu and Kashmir National Conference (JKNC) nominee Khalid Najib Suharwardy polled 13,334 votes, former Minister and DPAP’s candidate Abdul Majid Wani polled 10,027 votes, and Sheikh Riyaz Ahmed of Indian National Congress polled only 4,170 votes.
Similarly, PDP candidate Mansoor Ahmed Bhat polled 1,359 votes, and three independent candidates Bilal Khan, Jawaz Ahmed, and Tariq Hussain polled 618, 426, and 306 votes, respectively. 822 people rejected all the candidates as they voted in favor of NOTA (None of the Above).
Thirty-six-year-old Mehraj Malik, son of Shams Din Malik of Thathri, Doda, earlier made his party proud in the District Development Council (DDC) polls held in the year 2010 when he polled 6,535 votes against 3,024 votes polled in favor of his arch-rival, the Congress party’s candidate from the Kahara segment of the Doda District Development Council (DDC).
Malik had also contested the Parliamentary elections from Udhampur Lok Sabha segment in 2024, where he was the third runner-up with only 9,082 (0.82%) votes polled in his favour out of the total 11,13,727 votes.
Dr Jitendra Singh of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) polled the highest 5,71,076 (51.28%) votes in these polls, followed by Choudhary Lal Singh of Congress, who polled 4,46,703 (40.11%) votes, and former Minister GM Saroori (Independent), who polled 39,599 (3.56%) votes.
With Mehraj’s victory in the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly elections from the Doda Assembly segment, the AAP has marked its presence in the fifth State of the country after Delhi, Punjab, Goa, and Gujarat.
Mehraj Malik’s victory also carries significance in view of his contest with several bigwigs in his Constituency without his party’s Supremo or any other senior leader in his favour except party MP Sanjay Singh, who held a massive rally in Doda during his political campaign.
Pertinently, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), which failed to open an account in the Haryana Assembly polls, contested seven seats out of 90 in the J&K Assembly polls.
Jammu and Kashmir National Panthers Party (now India and Bhim), headed by Harsh Dev Singh and Vilakshan Singh, which couldn’t get any Assembly seat in the 2014 Assembly polls and has 2 DDCs in the Udhampur District Development Council, also failed to get any seat even from its traditional bastion Udhampur, where the party had fielded candidates in all the seats with Harsh Dev Singh and Ashri Devi emerging as runner-ups from Chenani and Ramnagar Assembly segments. The party also failed to get any seat from other Assembly constituencies where it had fielded candidates.
Another Jammu-based party, the Democratic Progressive Azad Party (DPAP), headed by Ghulam Nabi Azad, having several bigwigs in the contest, including former Minister Abdul Majid Wani, Vinod Kumar Mishra, Abdul Ghani, among others, also failed to get a single seat.
Similarly, the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), which had four MLAs in the 1996 Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly from Samba, Kathua, Bhaderwah, and RS Pura Assembly segments and performed tremendously in the consecutive polls, also failed to open its account in Jammu and Kashmir in the 2024 Assembly elections held after 10 years. However, one candidate of the party, Sandeep Majotra, was the runner-up in the Kathua Assembly segment.
Azad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram), led by Chandrashekhar Azad Ravan, which had fielded candidates from Jasrota, Hiranagar, Ramgarh, Samba, Marh, among other Assembly segments, Shiv Sena (UBT), which had party’s nominees in several Jammu districts, Janta Dal (United), Sainik Samaj Party, NDPI, National Awami United Party, Haq Insaf Party, Hindustan Shakti Sena, and several other parties also failed to open their account in the region.
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