When The Void Won The Vote

As municipal polls are held after a gap of 13 years, depressed turnout in Kashmir speaks of alienation

- Naseer Ganai in Bandipora and Baramulla

THE road to Bandipora is pacific, devoid of traffic on the morning of October 10. Shops along the way north from Srinagar are shut, while people can be seen congregating in small groups to talk to each other. Hardly promising portents for the second phase of Jammu and Kashmir’s urban civic election, held after a gap of 13 years and boycotted by major regional par­ties such as the National Conference (NC) and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP). A cacophony of reporters descends on the village of And­erkot in the Sumbal area of Bandip­ ora district in north Kashmir—the only polling station in the vicinity where they might catch a glimpse of that rara avis, the voter. In the neigh­bouring Hajin area, none of the 13 wards is even contested.

On approach, one sees that Anderkot is indeed a fortress, ringed with threetier security: army on the outside, CRPF in the middle and BSF on the inside. Concertina wire on all sides of the polling booth tops off this concentric defence, and voters may pass the portcullis only after a frisking. But the big sticks have come with little carrots: the BSF personnel at the booth are giving out biscuits to some children, who are favourably impressed.

As they enter the polling booth, the beaming faces of Bandipora deputy commissioner Shahid Choudhary and senior superintendent of police Sheikh Zulfikhar announce that they’re pleased with their work, having created an electoral oasis amid a desert. A BSF jawan recounts the horrors of this arid land: when he was posted in the Papachan area during the first phase, on October 8, nobody had turned out to vote—until the BSF forced 60 villagers to do so. “But people here (Anderkot) are friendly, and they are voting happily,” says the jawan, Ramesh Yadav.