If Rashid cannot be the king, he could be the kingmaker after October 8 when the results to the J&K assembly are declared.
The visible surge in Engineer Rashid's popularity in Kashmir's politics is giving jitters to his opponents and every political party in the fray for the assembly election.
And their fears are genuine, seeing the large crowd turnout at election rallies to hear the 58-year-old alleged terror accused and the MP from the Baramulla Lok Sabha constituency -- Sheikh Abdul Rashid, popularly known as Engineer Rashid because he has a civil engineering degree.
Rashid was arrested in a terror funding case on August 3, 2019, just before the Union government scrapped Article 370.
He was in jail for more than five years and secured interim bail from the National Investigating Agency court in New Delhi on September 11.
And in the couple of days since he returned to Kashmir, he seems to be everywhere in the Valley.
Youngsters throng to his rallies in different towns and villages of Kashmir to support Rashid's Awami Ittehad Party candidates.
Rashid makes use of social media to its fullest, providing regular updates of his party's election rally plans and his vision for Kashmir if elected to power.
On Wednesday, when he did a late night Facebook Live for more than an hour, nearly 100,000 Kashmiris logged in to hear him.
One Baramulla resident, Assar Rul Haq, wrote on Rashid's Facebook page, 'Today I realised the worth of my vote. I am proud that I voted for you. Abhi toh trailer hai, movie abhi baaki hai.'
Will this popularity convert into votes for Rashid's Awami Ittehad Party?
Too early to say because some Kashmiris call him an agent of the Bharatiya Janata Party who was released to cut into the votes of the National Conference and Peoples Democratic Party.
But everyone knows that Rashid cannot be taken lightly. He defeated National Conference candidate and former chief minister Omar Abdullah by 204,142 votes in the 2024 Lok Sabha election from Baramulla while in Tihar jail, without stepping out even once to campaign.
In the assembly elections his Awami Ittehad Party is not contesting more than 40 seats but observers believes that if Rashid cannot be the king, he could be the kingmaker after October 8 when the results to the J&K assembly are declared.
Jammu & Kashmir has 90 assembly seats of which 43 are located in Jammu and 47 are in Kashmir region.
What connects Rashid to the Kashmiri masses is his personal story.
Ever since terrorism began in Kashmir in the late 1980s more than one lakh Kashmiris have died and thousands are either languishing in jail, are out on bail or still going to court for hearings.
In recent years, the central government has sent Kashmiri political prisoners, stone throwers or dangerous terrorists to jails outside the Union Territory.
The stories of disgruntled Kashmiris is Engineer Rashid's story.
"I have suffered what every Kashmiri has suffered in the last 30 years," he tells a media interaction in Srinagar. "I have been in jail for more than five years. I ate only Dal and half a plate rice with two dozen Kashmiri fellow inmates in Tihar jail for the last five years."
"I had forgotten what a good meal looks like and tastes like. This is the first time I am eating a decent meal after five years. No other Kashmiri politician contesting the election has gone through what I have been through," he reminds Kashmiris.
Then, after a pause, he declares, "I am the only one who is fighting a tyrant."
"My Baramulla victory was a win against Prime Minister Modi's idea of Naya Kashmir," he asserts, trying to dispelling the notion that he is a BJP mole in the election process.
His supporters have coined a slogan for Rashid: 'Tihar ka badla, vote se (Revenge for Tihar jail through the vote)'.
While Omar Abdullah stopped short of calling Rashid a 'BJP agent', PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti did not pull her punches, calling Rashid 'a proxy of the BJP'.
'It is a shame that my political opponents are calling me an agent of BJP,' Rashid reacted, warning Abdullah, 'Omar will lose both his seats from Budgam and Ganderbal.'
'Omar is begging for votes by taking out his cap in front of voters. He is contesting from two seats because he is insecure and unsure of his victory. Omar knows that his time is up.'
'It was Mehbooba who gave a launch pad to the BJP in the Kashmir Valley by tying up with them to form the government,' Rashid added.
When told that the timing of his bail came amid indications that the National Conference-Congress alliance would sweep the Jammu and Kashmir assembly election, Rashid said, "Nobody raised this question with Arvind Kejriwal when he got interim bail during (the Lok Sabha) elections. Kejriwal got bail and so did I. What is wrong in it? I was lucky."
Despite the NC-PDP apprehensions that he is a BJP Trojan horse, Ram Madhav, who is supervising the BJP's J&K electoral strategy tweeted: 'This rank separatist, in jail for the last 5 years under UAPA for indulging in anti-India activities, is out on bail to further vitiate Valley politics.'
"I am ready to support the INDIA bloc if they assure me that they will restore Article 370 for Jammu and Kashmir," Rashid said at the media interaction. "If they do that I will tell all my candidates to pledge their votes to them."
Whatever the outcome on October 8, what cannot be denied is that with Rashid's sudden entry Kashmiri politics is in for a churn.
