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| BJP may draw a blank in Leh | | LAHDC elections | |
Early Times Report
jammu, Sept 2: The J&K Government has finalized schedule for constituting a new Ladakh Autonomous Hill Development Council (LAHDC), Leh. The election schedule is likely to be announced this week itself and if all goes well, the election process would be complete by October and the new council would be in place in the first of November. Out of the elected 26 members, the existing council has 21 members from the Congress and four from the BJP. The remaining one elected seat is held by an independent candidate. It is 30-member council 26 of whom are elected and the remaining four are nominated.
The NC and the PDP have no stakes in these elections, as these parties have little or no presence in the Leh district of Ladakh, notwithstanding the fact that they might test political waters in the trans-Himalayan region. Reports from Leh suggest that the Congress might win the impending elections. However, it is the BJP which has already announced that it will contest all the 26 seats and expressed hope that it would dislodge the Congress and form its council on its own strength. Some of the top BJP leaders were there in Leh last week to assess the situation and they made the announcement that the BJP would contest all the seats after making an on-the-spot assessment.
Will the BJP win the LAHDC elections? Reports from Leh are not encouraging for the BJP, which had created a history of sorts by winning for the first time the lone Ladakh Lok Sabha seat. It had won the seat with a slender margin. The BJP had won because the local BJP leadership had sought votes on the Union Territory status plank. During their election campaign, the Central BJP leadership had also promised that UT status would be granted to Leh within six months of Government formation. The other factor that led to the victory of the BJP in the Lok Sabha election was the Modi factor. However, in the Assembly elections which were held six months later, the BJP suffered a humiliating defeat because senior BJP leaders like Nitin Gadkari remained mum on the Ladakh's age old demand for UT status. It couldn't win a single seat out of the region's four. The Congress contested the election on UT status plank and won three of the four seats and the remaining fourth seat was one by an independent candidate, now with the ruling PDP.
The things for the BJP in Ladakh have not changed a bit. In fact, things have turned difficult for it with the people accusing the BJP of going back on its promise and playing "dirty" politics. What had made the task of the BJP all the more difficult is the agenda of alliance that it in collaboration with the PDP worked out and which, it says, shall be implemented in letter and spirit. The agenda of alliance doesn't inspire the people of Leh because there is no reference whatsoever to the Ladakhi demand for UT status. But more than that, the people of Ladakh have taken a strong exception to that part of the agenda of alliance that emphasizes Kashmiriyat at the cost of the liberal Ladakhiyat, or even Dogriyat, and describes J&K a disputed territory.
All this shows that the electoral chances of the BJP in the region are not very bright. It can put up a good show subject to the condition that it would contest the coming elections on UT status plank. It is unlikely to happen. The reason is that its coalition partner PDP, like all other Kashmir-based parties and militant outfits and civil society groups, oppose the Ladakhi demand for UT status saying grant of such a status to Ladakh would lead to the division of the State. Even otherwise, the chances of the BJP are bleak because a very strong anti-BJP wave is sweeping the State because of its various acts of omission and commission and its complete U-turn on everything that it held before the 2014 Assembly elections, as also because of its Kashmir-centric approach and policies. |
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