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Basharat Peer in Srinagar and Budgam
The second phase of polling in the Kashmir Valley was marked by a stark contrast between urban and rural areas. While Srinagar largely boycotted the process, there was brisk polling at other places in rural Kashmir.
Election officials put the turnout in Srinagar district at just 11 per cent, but in Budgam it was 51 per cent and in Jammu 59 per cent, giving an average of 42 per cent for the three districts.
The summer capital remained closed through the day and the indifference of citizens towards the electoral process was reflected in the number of votes polled.
At 25-Munshi Bagh polling booth in Sonawar constituency, where Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah and his family cast their votes, of the total 983 registered voters, only 34 had cast their votes till an hour before polling ended.
On the other side of the city, near the famous Hazratbal shrine, an area with a strong Shia population that was expected to vote, when polling staff sealed the electronic voting machines, it was a clear picture of boycott. Just nine votes were cast out of 1,168 in that booth. In two other booths in the same compound, Umerher municipal sub-office 1 and Umerher-5, 28 and nine votes were polled out of 1192 and 1305, respectively.
Some distance from the polling booths, a group of youths was busy playing cricket. Ahead, another group burned an effigy of Chief Minister Abdullah.
While security forces patrolled the streets and residents lazed in the marketplace discussing the day's developments, polling staff in Khanyar constituency, which has Works Minister Ali Mohammed Sagar as the National Conference nominee, returned to their residences after a "leisurely day at work".
"There was hardly any work to be done, except waiting for the voters," one official remarked. At booth 50, out of 991 votes, 15 were polled. At booth 22, out of 679 votes, not a single one was cast.
Moving south from this central Srinagar constituency, the mood remained that of a boycott. People not just stayed away, but resisted attempts by the Special Task Force of the state police to make them vote.
At Chanapora locality in Srinagar, which falls in Chadoora constituency, novelist turned historian Shabnam Qayoum's son Shahnawaz Qayoum was picked up by the STF after he refused to vote. "They asked me to vote, I disagreed, and they arrested me," Shahnawaz told rediff.com on being released a few hours later.
But a little ahead, in Chadoora town in Budgam district, enthusiastic voters filled the streets and formed long queues at the booths. It was a well-contested election here and a strong sentiment against the ruling party prevailed.
People's Democratic Party candidate Javed Mir seemed to be leading in Chadoora. Later he complained to state electoral officers that National Conference activists joined by Border Security Force and Central Reserve Police Force men had attacked him.
In Chrar-e-Sharief constituency, also in Budgam district, where the famous shrine was burnt in May 1995 in fighting between the army and militants, the turnout was heavy. State Finance Minister A R Rather was the National Conference nominee and there appeared to be a strong pro-Rather wave.
It was a similar story in Shia-dominated Budgam town. Voters turned out in large numbers. But there were clashes between two groups, injuring some people, at Chandepora village.
Moving from Budgam towards the hilly Beerwa constituency, the mood changed drastically. That c-word, coercion, reappeared. Villagers along the way to Beerwa complained of being forced by the security forces and the STF to vote.
At Charangam village, a few metres away from the polling booth, a shawl weaver, Ghulam Qadir Bhat, said: "The army came into our village at 6 in the morning and banged doors. We were not interested in voting, but they forced us out." Other villagers corroborated this.
A little further into hilly Beerwa, the entire Ganipora village was on the streets. Security forces brandishing weapons were moving threateningly and coercing villagers to vote. Women, young girls, and youths, who looked scared out of their wits, were coming out of the village in hordes. "The army said that if you do not vote, another army party will come and take care of you," Ghulam Nabi Sheikh, a local who was beaten up security forces after speaking to rediff.com, said.
Haja Rather, a middle-aged peasant woman, was frustrated at being caught between the two guns. "Militants will be mad if we vote and if we do not the army drags us out. Why do not they kill us once for all?" she said, crying hysterically.
At Beerwa village, people complained about the task force. The indifference towards voting showed in adjacent Sonipah where by noon barely 70 votes were cast out of a total of 1,100. "Look at this graveyard," said Abdul Majid, a Beerwa resident. "Around 100 youths who died for azadi [freedom] are buried here. How can I betray their sacrifice?"
But in Hizbul Mujahideen chief Syed Salahudin's Soibugh village, in Budgam constituency, there was no coercion. People came out to vote voluntarily. It was the issue of drinking water that determined participation in the election. The wave clearly was anti-NC. According to election officials, 58 per cent votes were polled in the entire Budgam district.
Meanwhile, in Ganderbal constituency, where the National Conference's candidate is its president Omar Abdullah, there was decent polling in villages like Lar, but certain parts boycotted the election. At the end of polling, at the 6-Ganderbal booth, for instance, only 44 of 732 votes had been polled. The opposition PDP alleged that National Conference workers beat up its polling agent and captured the booth.
While the presiding officer was overawed, the National Conference legislator from Sonawari, M A Lone, got tough with reporters investigating the incident and claimed that his presence inside the polling booth was because he was an observer for his party. The Election Commission's rules do not, however, provide for any such thing.
The electoral authorities, however, described the polls as peaceful and put the overall polling at 42 per cent for the second phase. Fourteen foreign diplomats went around the valley observing the process.
The state now prepares for the third phase of polling on October 1. "We are expecting better polling than in Srinagar, but lesser than in Budgam," a senior Election Commission officer said.
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