In redrawn Anantnag seat, Mehbooba Mufti fate bound in Gujjar-Pahari fault lines

In the first election being held in the reconstituted Anantnag-Rajouri Lok Sabha seat, which brings large parts of Jammu province into the Kashmir constituency, the clincher is expected to be the sharpened ethnic divide between the Gujjars and Paharis.

The BJP, whose government at the Centre met a long-standing demand of the Pahari community in giving them ST status – which has brought them in conflict with the Gujjars – is itself not in the contest. However, the BJP has been campaigning asking voters in Poonch-Rajouri (large parts of which fall under the constituency now) to vote for a “like-minded” party and not the Kashmir-centric National Conference (NC) or the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

A senior Pahari leader, Murtaza Khan, recently told the BJP not to “compel” Paharis to vote for any particular party, when it was itself not contesting, and went on to announce support for his former party, the PDP. A senior BJP leader then lashed out against the Paharis, with his allusion to the post-Partition violence in the area seen as a warning to them not to vote for the NC and PDP. While the BJP quickly expelled him, the bad taste lingers.

It is the PDP which has the most at stake in the Anantnag-Rajouri seat as its candidate here is its chiefMehbooba Mufti. Before delimitation, Anantnag used to be the PDP’s turf. An alliance with the NC, which the PDP was hoping for, also didn’t fructify.

The NC candidate, in fact, is giving Mufti a tough contest as he is a much-respected Gujjar spiritual leader, Mian Altaf. This has made the Pahari vote even more crucial for Mufti, a Kashmiri.

The other candidates in the constituency include the J&K Apni Party’s Zaffar Manhas, a Pahari from Kashmir’s Shopian district, and Advocate Mohammad