By: M I Jehangir
Srinagar: The entry of former Jamaat-e-Islami member Talat Majid Alie into the electoral fray has spiced up the contest in south Kashmir’s Pulwama assembly constituency. Three-time MLA Mohammad Khalil Bandh and PDP youth president Waheed Para are among the 12 candidates vying to represent the seat that was once a hotbed of militancy.
While there are seven independents in the fray for this constituency, the BJP surprisingly has not fielded a candidate from Pulwama.
In the run up to the poll announcement, the contest to represent Pulwama was seen as a two-horse race between Para and Bandh, who is contesting on a National Conference (NC) ticket. The two candidates were in the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) for more than a decade.
However, the dark horse in this constituency is Alie, a PhD holder in Soil Sciences. He was a Rukn-e-Jamaat (member of Jamaat) when the party was banned by the Centre in February 2019 for propagating separatism.
Alie had joined Apni Party founded by businessman-turned-politician Altaf Bukhari last year but is contesting the polls as an Independent candidate.
“I am not under any pressure. I have been advocating change since 2014. Since I did not get an opportunity there, I was looking for other options for a platform to bring that change,” Alie said when he announced his decision to contest the polls.
With several other influential Jamaat leaders contesting the polls as Independents — such as Sayar Ahmad Reshi in Kulgam and Abdul Rehman Shalla in Baramulla — observers believe their participation in the polls after 38 years might be a part of “behind-the-scenes deal” to get the ban on Jamaat-e-Islami revoked.
During the Lok Sabha polls, former Ameer-e-Jamaat (chief) Ghulam Qadri Wani had expressed willingness to participate in assembly polls if the ban on his organisation was revoked in time.
The 72-year-old Bandh, who started his political career with the NC in the 1970s, joined the PDP when the regional party was formed towards the end of last millennium.
He scored a hat-trick of wins in the assembly elections from Pulwama as a PDP candidate in 2002, 2008 and 2014. It was widely believed that the party founded by Mufti Mohammad Sayeed had the tacit support of Jamaat-e-Islami in the polls.
Bandh returned to the NC in the aftermath of collapse of PDP-BJP coalition government in 2018 and is the official candidate of the INDIA bloc. The NC, which is the oldest political party of Jammu and Kashmir, has entered into a pre-poll alliance with the Congress for these elections.
Para, the PDP youth president, will be banking on his work at the grassroots level during the PDP-BJP coalition government’s tenure to break Bandh’s grasp on the south Kashmir constituency.
Political analysts believe that Para, the rising star of Kashmir politics, will not have the luxury of Jamaat support in these elections as the banned organisation has fielded one of its own.
The PDP youth president, who was handpicked by Mufti Mohammad Sayeed and given key role in the party, is currently out on bail. He was arrested in 2020 for his alleged links with militancy and is an accused in an Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967 (UAPA) case.
Para was fielded by the PDP in the Lok Sabha elections earlier this year but he stood a distant second, securing 25 percent votes behind NC’s Aga Ruhullah, who got 53 percent of the votes polled.
