Last Updated on January 4, 2021 at 3:14 pm
There are speculations being circulated that the assembly elections in Jammu and Kashmir can get postponed by one more year as delimitation process is not yet over. Reports claim that the delimitation exercise might take a while to finish. This was done for remarking the boundaries of the assembly and parliamentary constituencies.
The delimitation commission was constituted for this purpose in March this year. This commission is asked to fix boundaries of 90 Assembly segments and reserve seats for Scheduled Castes (SC) and Schedule Tribes (ST).
According to media reports, the panel has not finalised anything yet and would take some more time to complete the process. Media reports claim that it probably would take over ten months more to redraw the constituency boundaries in J&K as the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has halted the process.
An analyst told Early Times said that both Jammu and Kashmir will have equal representation whenever assembly elections are held in J&K. Leaders from Jammu will have an equal opportunity of becoming Chief Minister of J&K as a leader from Kashmir, which was not quite the scene in the past. During the past seventy years, Kashmiri leaders have dominated the J&K government office because of a higher number of seats in Kashmir which delimitation seeks to fix.
He said that the times have changed now and people in Jammu are eagerly waiting for the delimitation exercise to finish. Even if its implementation takes a year it won’t matter. Jammuties want their due representation in the Legislative Assembly. They have been waiting for delimitation for the past seventy years and one more year won’t matter much.
An observer remarked that results of the recently conducted District Development Council elections indicate that Kashmir centric parties are not united and Peoples Alliance for Gupkar Declaration (PAGD) is just a failed experiment and nothing more. This time, Jammu leaders will play as an equally important role in politics of the UT as a leader from Kashmir and legislative seats will not be tilted in the latter’s favour.
