Even as the BJP has opted not to field its candidates for the three Lok Sabha seats in Kashmir, party leaders are actively campaigning in the Valley, urging people not to vote for the National Conference (NC), Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the Congress.

This has left the electorate wondering about the stakes of the BJP on the three seats for which polling, starting from the Srinagar seat, will begin on 13 May. The other two seats are Anantnag and Baramulla.

This is the first major election after the abrogation of Article 370 by the Modi government in August 2019 and this is also for the first time after the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha elections that the BJP has chosen not to field its candidates in Kashmir.

Interestingly, Article 370 that granted special status to J&K has become BJP’s main poll plank in the ongoing elections elsewhere in the country, but questions are being raised on the party not contesting the three seats in the core area of Kashmir. The BJP has contested the two seats of the Jammu region for which polling has already been done.

The NC and the PDP, which were partners in the INDIA bloc, are contesting the election against each other. The other parties in the fray are the Peoples Conference of the former separatist leader Sajad Lone, Altaf Bukhari’s Apni Party and Ghulam Nabi Azad’s Democratic Progressive Azad Party (DPAP) which are being labelled as proxies of the BJP by the NC and the PDP. The Congress is supporting the NC in the Kashmir valley.

It is worth mentioning that the BJP leadership has reportedly mobilised its activists, particularly in the Rajouri and Poonch districts of Jammu. These districts have been incorporated into the Anantnag constituency after the recent delimitation. PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti is contesting the Anantnag seat.

BJP’s national general secretary and in-charge of the party in J&K, Tarun Chugh was holding meetings in the two districts bordering Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (POJK).

Chugh on Friday hit out at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi in Poonch and accused the opposition party of furthering Pakistan’s agenda by questioning surgical strikes and the implementation of the Citizenship Amendment Act.

Provincial President of NC Rattan Lal Gupta said that with no BJP candidate in fray in Kashmir, Chugh’s role is immaterial. “If BJP was confident of its claims on development and normalcy, then the party should have fielded its own candidates instead of its proxies on the three seats in Kashmir,” Gupta added. Other opposition parties have also raised questions about BJP leaders campaigning without their candidates.

It is worth mentioning that the BJP has been on a sticky wicket in Kashmir during the Lok Sabha elections in 2014 and 2019, with its candidates suffering significant defeats. However, the party’s vote percentage improved to 8.19 in 2019 from 1.26 in 2014 in the Anantnag constituency.

Likewise, BJP’s poll percentage in Srinagar was 2.48% in 2019 against 1.43% in 2014. Its vote percentage in Baramulla also slightly increased to 1.73% in 2019 against 1.41% in 2014.

In contrast, the NC winners in 2019, Dr Farooq Abdullah (Srinagar), Hasnain Masoodi (Anantnag) and Mohammad Akbar Lone (Baramulla), secured 57.14%, 32.17% and 29.29% votes, respectively.