A Return to the Ballot?

Separatist politics may not influence the general elections in Kashmir this time

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Naseer Ganai in Kulgam, Shopian and Budgam

A solitary house fortified with high walls, topped with concertina wire, and guarded by a paramilitary bunker provides the only visibly political footprint after a 70-km journey towards Damhal Hanjipora in Jammu and Kashmir's (J&K) Kulgam region.

In its front yard flies a National Conference (NC) flag. Inside is a large hall decorated with portraits, where party workers meet. The portraits that stare down from the walls feature the illustrious lineage of the party's past and present-day protagonists, NC founder Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah; his son and current president Farooq Abdullah; and the former's grandson, Vice President Omar Abdullah. Prominently placed alongside is a photograph of Wali Mohammad Itoo, a veteran party leader, former Speaker of the J&K assembly and the man to whom the house once belonged.

Itoo was assassinated by militants at point-blank range on March 18, 1994. The fortified house now belongs to his daughter, Sakina Itoo, a former state minister. At the time of her father's death, she was a college student pursuing medicine. In 1996, just before the erstwhile state of J&K held its first state assembly election after a gap of nearly a decade, Farooq Abdullah convinced her to contest the polls. She ended up winning the Noorabad seat in southern Kashmir, a stronghold her father had secured three timesin 1977, 1983, and 1987. During her 2002 campaign, Sakina survived six assassination attempts. She was luckier than her deceased father. In another incident in July 2006, she narrowly escaped a grenade attack as well.

As she walks into the hall, Sakina says that militants have targeted her house at least 13 times over the past 25 years.

"But now we are being doubted. We are asked to obtain permissions for all aspects of our political activities,