The Election Commission announced the date of elections for Jammu-Kashmir and Haryana Assembly on Friday. Elections will be held in three phases in Jammu and Kashmir, while elections on 90 seats in Haryana will be held in one phase only. The election results of both the states will be released on October 4. This is the first time after the results of Lok Sabha elections when BJP and Congress will once again face each other in the electoral arena. The first direct contest after the Lok Sabha elections is to take place in Haryana.
Now the question is who will win the assembly election? Will BJP score a hat-trick or will Congress make a comeback? All the parties have their own claims regarding their performance in the elections, but there are mainly two big players in the electoral arena. The parties contesting in Haryana elections are the alliance of BJP, Congress, Aam Aadmi Party, JJP, Indian National Lok Dal and BSP. The big thing is that there is an alliance of Aam Aadmi Party and Congress in Delhi under the flag of INDIA alliance, but in Haryana both the parties will contest elections separately.
Congress’s account opened in Lok Sabha
Congress claims that BJP’s defeat in the assembly elections is certain. The reason behind Congress’s claim is their performance in the Lok Sabha. In fact, Congress could not win even a single seat in the 2019 elections in Haryana, but it reached 5 seats in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. Where Congress’ vote share increased from 28.51 percent votes in 2019 to 43.67 percent. That means Congress was successful in increasing its vote share along with seats. If we understand in simple words, the results of Lok Sabha elections were 50-50, which means that the path of assembly elections will not be easy for BJP. However, just before the announcement of election dates, Chief Minister Nayab Singh Saini announced several schemes to please the farmers.
Also read: Voting in J&K on 18th, 25th September, 1st October, one in Haryana also, results on 4th October
These three big issues will be in Haryana elections
There are three big issues in the Haryana Assembly elections, on which Congress is attacking and BJP is on the backfoot. The first issue is farmers’ displeasure over MSP. The second issue is resentment regarding Agniveer scheme. The third issue is the case of sexual exploitation of a female wrestler. Even though all three agricultural laws have been repealed, farmers are still agitating in Haryana and Punjab demanding MSP. Farmers have been sitting on the Haryana-Punjab border for several months. A few days ago, the farmers’ group had met Rahul Gandhi in the Parliament. Rahul had promised to provide legal guarantee to the farmers on MSP.
In such a situation, the issue of farmers will dominate the state assembly elections, while on the other hand, BJP will counter the opposition’s narrative through its social engineering. To solve the caste equation, BJP removed Manohar Lal Khattar and made Naib Singh Saini the Chief Minister. A Brahmin face was placed on the chair of the state president and to make a dent in the Jat vote, Congress rebel and daughter-in-law of former Haryana CM Bansi Lal, Kiran Choudhary was included in the party. Now the question is whether BJP will be able to remove the resentment of Jat community with the entry of Kiran Choudhary, because in Haryana, BJP’s entire focus is on non-Jat voters.
Haryana’s caste equation is something like this
To solve the caste equation in Haryana, all the parties have prepared a formula of social engineering. BJP’s entire focus is on non-Jat voters, Congress’s focus is on Jat and Dalit voters, INLD and JJP’s influence is mainly limited to Jat voters. Your focus is on all the voters. By the way, what is the caste equation of Haryana, it can be understood like this.
Jat – 22 percent
Dalit – 20 percent
Ahir – 10 percent
Brahmin – 8 percent
Punjabi – 8 percent
Muslim – 7 percent
Sikh – 4.9 percent
Rajput – 4 percent
Gurjar – 2.8 percent
Saini – 2.5 percent
Vishnoi – 2 percent
Assembly elections will be held in Jammu and Kashmir after 10 years
Election dates have also been announced in Jammu and Kashmir. Elections are being held in Jammu and Kashmir after 2014 i.e. after 10 years. In Jammu and Kashmir, voting is to be held in three phases on 24 seats on September 18, on 25 September on 25 seats and on October 1 on 40 seats, and the results will come on October 4. But after the abolition of Article 370, the situation is different now. Jammu and Kashmir has become a Union Territory and after delimitation the seats have also increased. Actually, in 2014, elections were held on 87 seats in Jammu and Kashmir, now the seats have increased to 90. Talking about Jammu region, earlier there were 37 seats, which has now increased to 43 seats and in Kashmir region, earlier there were 46 seats, which has now increased to 47 seats. Earlier 4 seats of Ladakh were included in Jammu and Kashmir, but now Ladakh has become a separate UT.
Which party has lead on how many seats?
Let us tell you that in December last year, the Supreme Court had ordered to hold elections by 30th September and the elections are being held within the same deadline. After the removal of Article 370, 2024 Lok Sabha elections have also been held in Jammu and Kashmir. And now the dates of assembly elections have come. Let us tell you who has lead on how many seats in Jammu and Kashmir on the basis of Lok Sabha elections.
NDA is leading on 30 seats, in which BJP-20 and People’s Conference are leading on 1 seat and INDIA alliance is leading on 46 seats. In this, National Conference is ahead on 34 seats, Congress on 7, PDP on 5 and others on 14 seats, in which independents are ahead on 14 seats. In this respect, PDP does not seem to be standing anywhere this time. That PDP, which had formed the government last time in alliance with BJP. But this time the elections in Jammu and Kashmir are different and there is a competition between National Conference and BJP.
With the abolition of Articles 370 and 35A on 5 August 2019, Jammu and Kashmir became a Union Territory. After this, regional parties like National Conference and PDP got a big blow. But to ensure that the atmosphere in Jammu and Kashmir does not deteriorate, Mehbooba Mufti and Omar Abdullah were put under house arrest. Then the question was that who knows what will happen to Jammu and Kashmir now? But the situation changed and peace was restored in Jammu and Kashmir. First Lok Sabha elections were held, now once again assembly elections are going to be held.
Also read: ‘Hope all parties will get equal opportunities…’, Farooq Abdullah said on the announcement of elections in Jammu and Kashmir.
Voting on how many seats in which phase
Voting on 24 seats in the first phase on September 18.
Voting on 26 seats in the second phase on September 25.
Voting will be held on 40 seats in the third phase on October 1.
-The results of all seats will come on October 4.
BJP’s mission started with PM Modi’s JK tour
Narendra Modi reached Jammu and Kashmir on June 4 after the results of the Lok Sabha elections were declared and after taking oath as Prime Minister for the third time. Here he distributed appointment letters to the youth and laid the foundation stone of 84 projects worth Rs 1500 crore and projects worth Rs 1800 crore for the development of agriculture and allied sectors. That means BJP’s mission election had started from here. The big thing is that elections are being held in Jammu and Kashmir after 2014 i.e. after 10 years. Assembly elections were held in Jammu and Kashmir in December 2014. Then no party got absolute majority. PDP became the largest party with 28 seats, BJP became the second largest party with 25 seats. Then BJP had won the maximum seats in Jammu region, while PDP had won the maximum seats in Kashmir region.
The election battle of Jammu and Kashmir is interesting
In March 2015, in the BJP-PDP alliance, PDP’s Mufti Mohammad Sayeed became the CM and BJP’s Nirmal Singh became the Deputy Chief Minister. Jammu and Kashmir CM Mufti Mohammad Sayeed died on 7 January 2016. On April 4, 2016, PDP’s Mehbooba Mufti became the CM in the BJP-PDP alliance. On 19 June 2018, BJP withdrew support from the PDP government. Governor’s rule came into force in Jammu and Kashmir on 20 June 2018 and the Assembly there was dissolved on 21 November 2018. On August 5, 2019, Article 370 was abolished from Jammu and Kashmir, Jammu and Kashmir became a union territory, Ladakh became a separate union territory. After delimitation, the seats of Jammu and Kashmir have increased from 87 to 90. This time the election battle of Jammu and Kashmir is very tough. BJP has laid the entire chessboard in the last 5 years, while regional parties in Kashmir also seem desperate to take revenge from BJP in the elections. And Congress may be seen standing with these regional parties against BJP. Farooq Abdullah says that he is also ready to become the CM of Jammu and Kashmir.
(AajTak Bureau)