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After emerging as the single largest party in the District Development Council in Jammu and Kashmir following the elections, the BJP claimed that people have approved the Centre’s decision to abrogate Article 370 of the Constitution.
Party leader and Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad told reporters at a press conference here on Wednesday that the BJP has got more votes than both the People's Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD) and Congress.
While the PAGD bagged 110 seats, the BJP put up a strong show in the Jammu region. “Lotus has bloomed in the valley,” he said and added that the PAGD was formed because its constituents knew that they could not fight the BJP on their own. “This is a victory for India, democracy, hope, development and people of Jammu and Kashmir. This is a victory for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s larger narrative for Jammu and Kashmir,” Prasad said.
He said development work was ushered in under the central rule in the region, and people in Kashmir have now distinguished between those who rule and those who serve.
However, the CPI(M), a part of the PAGD, said the result is a clear indication that the people of Jammu and Kashmir want restoration of their rights. The party leader Mohammed Yousuf Tarigami said the verdict is an eye-opener for the BJP government which had launched a propaganda last August that people of Jammu and Kashmir have accepted the revoking of the erstwhile State’s special status under Article 370. “Participation of the people in large numbers in these polls is a clear indication that they want to fight for their ‘snatched’ constitutional rights in a democratic manner. An attempt is also being made to polarise the verdict by showing that BJP won big in Jammu. This is not the reality. If we analyse the polls results, it clearly shows that the BJP is not all over in Jammu,” Tarigami said.
Other winners
Out of the 278 seats for which results have been declared, Independents have won 50, Congress 26, Apni Party 12, PDF and the National Panthers Party two each and the BSP one.
Two Pakistan-occupied Kashmir nationals (PoK), who are married to former militants, are among the contestants from the Dragmulla constituency in Kupwara and Hajin-A in Bandipora and the state Election Commissioner has directed the returning officers concerned to defer the counting of votes in the two constituencies till further orders, the officials said.
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